It was on a cold and rainy afternoon on June 26, 1951 when Althea Gibson became the first black player to play at The Championships at Wimbledon, This came 10 months after becoming the first black player to compete in a major when she played the U.S. Championships the previous summer. Gibson won her first match in her debut Wimbledon, defeating Pat Ward of Great Britain 6-0, 2-6, 6-4 on Centre Court. The Associated Press reported of Gibson, “Although the tall Negro girl is unseeded, she convinced the British experts that she has the equipment to rank high in the world within another year or two.” In the second round, Gibson then lost to No. 5 seed and fellow American Beverly Baker 6-1, 6-3.
Gibson discusses how she came to Wimbledon for the first time in her republished autobiography “I Always Wanted To Be Somebody” (for sale and download here:
https://a.co/d/07VtcO0n). Expenses were the biggest problem for Gibson, but she found some unexpected help from the world famous boxer Joe Louis, as she writes below.
Before I went back to college I had lunch one day at the Crossroads Restaurant on 42nd Street and Broadway with Bertram Baker of the A.T.A. and Hollis Dann of the U.S.L.T.A. to talk about the possibilities of my playing at Wimbledon in the spring of 1951. The U.S.L.T.A. had no objections, but they weren’t about to pay my way, either. However, they did suggest through Mr. Dann that, if I was serious about going, I ought to get a little more instruction, and they said they would arrange for me to go out to Hamtramck, Michigan, which is a suburb of Detroit, under their auspices, to work out with Jean Hoxie, one of the best-known tennis teachers in the country. I thought that was a fine idea, and in addition I was lucky enough to be invited to play in the Good Neighbor tournament at Miami, in March. I understand I was the first Negro player ever to compete in a mixed tournament anywhere in the Deep South. It was quite an experience. I felt as though I were on display, being studied through a microscope, every minute.
When I first got to Miami, the tournament officials put me up at a very nice hotel on Miami Beach, the Admiral. I appreciated the gesture, and what it meant, but after I’d spent one night there I asked them to let me switch to the Mary Elizabeth, a hotel for Negroes in Miami proper. I was lonesome at the Admiral, all by myself. I’m an authority on what it feels like to be the only Negro in all-white surroundings, and I can assure you that it can be very lonely.
As soon as I finished my final exams at A&M that May, I flew out to Detroit. Bill Matney, a reporter for one of the Negro newspapers in Detroit, met me at the airport and took me to the Gotham Hotel, where the manager told me with a big smile that Joe Louis had left word with him that I was to use his personal suite while I was in town. So, I had nothing but the best, all for nothing, and I was glad I had a chance to tell Joe how much I appreciated it before I left for England. He bought me some breakfast one morning, talked to me about how I was doing, and told me he would have a round-trip airplane ticket to London left for me at Idlewild Airport in New York. What a guy.
I don’t know how much I improved my tennis while I was in Detroit, but the Negro people there were wonderful to me. They even put on a benefit show at the Flame Show Bar and raised seven hundred and seventy dollars for me to use for hotels, meals and spending money on the trip to England. Before I left, Bill Matney took me into one of the downtown banks and drew out all the money that had been raised for me. Then he bought me a round-trip ticket to London and gave me the leftover cash. I didn’t say anything about the ticket Joe had promised me because I was afraid maybe the champ would forget about it. But I should have known better. When I got to Idlewild, the ticket from Joe was there. So, I cashed in the one Bill Matney had bought for me, turned over the money to Bertram Baker and asked him to keep it for me until I got back. I was flush.
Unfortunately, a pocketful of money wasn’t enough to win for me at Wimbledon. All I got was more experience.
