Meet Arthur Ashe: The Champion Who Measured Himself by Service
MentorMinds
A game played against the odds
Arthur Ashe grew up in Richmond, Virginia, where the best public courts were closed to Black players. He became the first Black player picked for the US Davis Cup team, won the first US Open of the Open era as an amateur in 1968, and in 1975 beat Jimmy Connors at Wimbledon by taking the pace off the ball until Connors had nothing to hit against.
Off the court
He was arrested protesting apartheid in 1985, wrote a three-volume history of Black American athletes, and — after contracting HIV from a transfusion — spent his last year campaigning on AIDS, finishing his memoir weeks before he died.
Why they belong at your table
Seat Ashe when you need strategy and dignity in the same conversation — when the situation is unfair and you still have to play the match in front of you.
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