Althea
In 1957, Althea Gibson defeated Darlene Hard in the Wimbledon Women's Final, winning the ladies' singles tennis title that year. Gibson was the first Black champion in the tournament’s history, accepting the trophy from Queen Elizabeth II.
Taking top prizes at Wimbledon and Forest Hills, Gibson in 1957 and 1958 was the Number One ranked female tennis player in the world. She had broken the color barrier in 1950 and risen to become America's first Black tennis superstar.
Yet today, many do not know her name.
In Althea: The Life of Tennis Champion Althea Gibson, prize-winning former Boston Globe reporter Sally H. Jacobs tells the moving story of this forgotten pioneer in vivid detail, restoring Althea Gibson to her rightful place in American sports and social history.
Hardcover ◦ Audiobook ◦ E-Book
Althea: The Life of Tennis Champion Althea Gibson
By Sally H. Jacobs
August 15, 2023
“Brilliantly reveals an American sports legend long overlooked.”
“A comprehensive and elegantly written life of Althea Gibson, one of the greatest athletes America has produced … An essential book about an incomparably authentic American pioneer and the times in which she lived.”
In 1950, three years after Jackie Robinson walked onto the diamond at Ebbets Field, the all-white, upper-crust US Lawn Tennis Association opened its door a crack to receive a powerhouse player who would integrate "the game of royalty." A street-savvy young Black woman from Harlem, Althea Gibson was as out-of-place in that world as any aspiring tennis champion could be.
Her tattered jeans and short-cropped hair drew stares from everyone who watched her play, but her astonishing performance on the court soon eclipsed the negative feelings being cast her way as she came into her own as one of the greatest American tennis champions.
Gibson’s talent on the court opened the door for her to compete around the world. She wound up shaking hands with Queen Elizabeth II, being driven up Broadway in a snowstorm of ticker tape, and was the first Black woman to appear on the cover of Sports Illustrated and the second to appear on the cover of Time.
Seven years later she broke the color barrier again where she became the first Black woman to join the Ladies Professional Golf Association (LPGA).
In Althea, prize-winning former Boston Globe reporter Sally H. Jacobs tells the heart-rending story of this pioneer, a remarkable woman who was a trailblazer, a champion, and one of the most remarkable Americans of the twentieth century.
More than fifteen years after she died, a sculpture of Althea was installed at the Billie Jean King National Tennis Center in Queens in 2019. Photo: Jeenah Moon for The New York Times.
Althea Gibson, Tennis Star Ahead of Her Time, Gets Her Due at Last
In the nearly five decades after she won world prominence in two sports, Althea received relatively little permanent recognition. Even at the U.S.T.A.’s national tennis center in Queens, N.Y. where the names of both Arthur Ashe and Billie Jean King had been emblazoned on public structures, little had been done for the Harlem athlete. But in 2019, the powers that be finally paid tribute to the barrier-breaking tennis champion and unveiled a granite sculpture of Althea who won 11 Grand Slam titles during her career.
Sally H. Jacobs, “Althea Gibson, Tennis Star Ahead of Her Time, Gets Her Due at Last,” The New York Times, August 26, 2019.
Sally H. Jacobs
Photo: Robin Lubbock
Sally H. Jacobs is a former reporter for the Boston Globe and the author of The Other Barack, a biography of Barack Obama Sr.
She is the winner of The George Polk Award and the Pulitzer Prize for Breaking News awarded the Globe newsroom in 2014.