Arthur Ashe, in full
Arthur Robert Ashe (born July 10, 1943,
Richmond,
Virginia, U.S.—died February 6, 1993,
New york New York), American tennis player, the first black winner of a major men’s
singles championship.
Ashe began to play tennis at the age of seven in a neighbourhood
park. He was coached by Walter Johnson of Lynchburg, Virginia, who had
coached tennis champion
Althea Gibson.
Ashe moved to St. Louis, Missouri, where he was coached by Richard
Hudlin, before he entered the University of California at Los Angeles on
a tennis scholarship. In 1963 Ashe won the U.S. hard-court singles
championship; in 1965 he took the intercollegiate singles and doubles
titles; and in 1967 he won the U.S. clay-court singles championship. In
1968 he captured the U.S. (amateur) singles and open singles
championships. He played on the U.S.
Davis Cup team (1963–70, 1975, 1977–78) and helped the U.S. team to win the
Davis Cup challenge (final) round in 1968, 1969, and 1970. In the latter year he became a professional.
His criticism of South African apartheid racial policy led to denial
of permission to play in that country’s open tournament, and, as a
consequence, on March 23, 1970, South Africa was excluded from Davis Cup
competition. In 1975, when he won the Wimbledon singles and the World
Championship singles, he was ranked first in world tennis. After
retiring from play in 1980, he became captain of the U.S. Davis Cup
team, a position he held from 1981 to 1985.
Ashe underwent coronary bypass operations in 1979 and 1983. In April
1992 he revealed that he had become infected with the virus that causes
AIDS probably through a tainted
blood transfusion
received during one of those operations. For the remainder of his life,
Ashe devoted considerable time to efforts to educate the public about
the disease.
SOURCE: yohanamwila.blogspot.com
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