ARTHUR ROBERT ASHE
July 10, 1943 – February 6, 1993
Arthur Ashe took the world by storm a chosen child with a vision. He became the first, and is still the only, African-American male player to win the U.S. Open and Wimbledon. He is also the first black American to be ranked No. 1 in the world.
Ashe was the first black player selected to the United States Davis Cup team and the only black man ever to win the singles title at Wimbledon, the US Open, and the Australian Open. He retired in 1980. He was ranked world No. 1 by Harry Hopman in 1968 and by Lance Tingay of The Daily Telegraph and World Tennis Magazine in 1975. In the ATP computer rankings, he peaked at No. 2 in May 1976.
In the early 1980s, Ashe is believed to have contracted HIV from a blood transfusion he received during heart bypass surgery. Ashe publicly announced his illness in April 1992 and began working to educate others about HIV and AIDS. He founded the Arthur Ashe Foundation for the Defeat of AIDS and the Arthur Ashe Institute for Urban Health before his death from AIDS-related pneumonia at age 49 on February 6, 1993.
On June 20, 1993, Ashe was posthumously awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by the United States President Bill Clinton.
Arthur Robert Ashe Jr. was born on July 10, 1943, in Richmond, Virginia. Arthur graduated UCLA with a Bachelor’s Degree in Business Administration.
On February 20, 1977, Arthur Ashe married his long time girlfriend Jeanne Moutoussamy, a photographer he met in October 1976 at a United Negro College Fund benefit. Despite his injury days before he was wearing a foot cast at their ceremony was in the United Nations chapel, New York City.
Ashe remains the only black man to win the singles title at Wimbledon, the US Open.
During the late seventies and early eighties, Ashe underwent a series of heart surgeries. In December 1986, Arthur and his wife adopted a daughter. They named her Camera after her mother’s profession. In 1988, Ashe published a three-volume book titled A Hard Road to Glory: A History of the African-American Athlete, after working with a team of researchers for nearly six years. Ashe stated that the book was more important than any tennis title. Ashe was also an active civil rights supporter. He was a member of a delegation of 31 prominent African-Americans who visited South Africa to observe the political change in the country as it approached racial integration. He was arrested on January 11, 1985, for protesting outside the Embassy of South Africa, Washington, D.C. during an anti-apartheid rally. He was arrested again on September 9, 1992, outside the White House for protesting the recent crackdown on Haitian refugees.
Arthur Ashe was a true human with grace and was filled with the passion to succeed and to beat all the odds of racism and bring that into light to the world of sports. He was and will always be the first in the field of men’s. Unfortunately without the proper testing of the blood being used in his heart bypass surgery a contaminated blood bag was used to do the transfusion ( which was to be non-contaminated for I am sure they had to have ) . He became infected and eventually succumbed to the Immune Deficiency Disease. He was an advocate for the disease and brought it to mainstream media for the first time.
He pushed for a charity and founded the Arthur Ashe Foundation for the Defeat of AIDS. Two months before his death, he founded the Arthur Ashe Institute for Urban Health to help address issues of inadequate health care delivery and was named Sports Illustrated magazine’s Sportsman of the Year. He also spent much of the last years of his life writing his memoir Days of Grace, finishing the manuscript less than a week before his death. Shortly afterwards Arthur Ashe passed away in 1993 on February 6. He has left behind a legacy that is impeccable and no one can come close to in the world of Men’s tennis. There was and only will be one and Arthur was the one. His funeral was held at the Arthur Ashe Athletic Center in Richmond, Virginia, on February 10 He is buried alongside his mother, Mattie Ashe , who died in 1950, in Woodland Cemetery in Richmond, Virginia. On February 12, 1993, a memorial service for Ashe was held at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine in Manhattan. In Richmond, Virginia, where his statue by sculptor Paul DiPasquale is on Monument Avenue, his legacy lives on
AWARDS HONORS
In 1979, Arthur Ashe was inducted into the Virginia Sports Hall of Fame. In commenting on his induction, the Hall noted that, ”Arthur Ashe was certainly a hero to people of all ages and races, and his legacy continues to touch the lives of many today. For Arthur Ashe, tennis was a means to an end. Although he had a lucrative tennis career, it was always more than personal glory and individual accolades. He used his status as an elite tennis player to speak out against the moral inequalities that existed both in and out of the tennis world. Ashe sincerely wanted to bring about change in the world. What made him stand out was that he became a world champion along the way.”
In 1982, The Arthur Ashe Athletic Center, a 6,000 seat multi-purpose arena was built in Richmond, Virginia. It hosts local sporting events and concerts.
He was inducted into the Intercollegiate Tennis Association (ITA) Hall of Fame in 1983.
In 1985, Ashe was inducted into the International Tennis Hall of Fame.
In 1986, Ashe won a Sports Emmy for co-writing the documentary “A Hard Road to Glory,” co-written with Bryan Polivka.
On June 20, 1993, Ashe was posthumously awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by President Bill Clinton.
In 1993, Ashe received the Award for Greatest Public Service Benefiting the Disadvantaged, an award given out annually by Jefferson Awards.
In 1996 The city of Richmond posthumously honored Ashe’s life with a statue on Monument Avenue, a place traditionally reserved for statues of key figures of the Confederacy. This decision led to some controversy in a city that was the capital of the Confederate States during the American Civil War.
The main stadium at the USTA National Tennis Center in Flushing Meadows Park, where the US Open is played, is named Arthur Ashe Stadium in his honor. This is also the home of the annual Arthur Ashe Kids’ Day.
In 2002, Ashe’s achievement at Wimbledon in 1975 was voted 95th in Channel 4’s 100 Greatest Sporting Moments.
In 2002, scholar Molefi Kete Asante listed Arthur Ashe on his list of 100 Greatest African Americans.
In 2005, the United States Postal Service announced the release of an Arthur Ashe commemorative postal stamp, the first stamp ever to feature the cover of a Sports Illustrated magazine.
Also in 2005, TENNIS Magazine put him in 30th place in their list of the 40 Greatest Players of the TENNIS Era.
His wife wrote a book, Daddy and Me, a photographic journey told from the perspective of his young daughter. Another book, Arthur Ashe and Me, also gives young readers a chance to learn about his life.
ESPN’s annual sports awards, the ESPY Awards, hands out the Arthur Ashe for Courage Award to a member of the sports world who best exhibits courage in the face of adversity.
Philadelphia’s Arthur Ashe Youth Tennis and Education Center and Richmond’s Arthur Ashe Athletic Center are named for Ashe.
The Arthur Ashe Student Health and Wellness Center at Ashe’s alma mater, UCLA, is named for him. The center opened in 1997.
On June 22, 2019, the renaming of Boulevard as “Arthur Ashe Boulevard” was celebrated with a grand opening in Richmond, Virginia.