Althea Gibson Biography – life Story, Career, Awards, Age, Height

Althea Gibson Facts
Althea Gibson is cited now not handiest for her tremendous talents as a tennis player, but for breaking the color barrier inside the Nineteen Fifties because the first African American to compete in national and worldwide tennis.

Born in Silver, South Carolina, in 1927, Althea Gibson have become the dominant woman athlete of the past due 1950s in a recreation widely known for its custom of racial segregation. Tennis become now not Gibson’s first game; rather, she shot pool, bowled, and performed basketball. She even boxed a touch.

Childhood in Harlem
During the Depression the Gibson own family moved north to Harlem. When she was ten years antique, Gibson have become concerned with the Police Athletic League (PAL) movement referred to as “play streets.” Essentially, PAL become an try to help afflicted kids establish work behavior they might use later in existence. In 1940 in Harlem, PAL promoted paddleball. After three summers of paddleball competition Gibson became so top that the Cosmopolitan Tennis Club sponsored her to study the sport of tennis and proper social conduct.

In 1942 Gibson started out winning tournaments subsidized by way of the American Tennis Association (ATA), the black counterpart to the United States Lawn Tennis Association (USLTA). In 1944 and 1945 Gibson won the ATA National Junior Championships. In 1946 Gibson became recognized by using politically astute blacks as a participant who may want to assist smash down institutionalized racism inside the United States. Sponsored with the aid of Hubert Eaton and Walter Johnson and stimulated by way of Sugar Ray Robinson, Gibson quickly ruled every occasion at the ATA schedule. By the beginning of the 1950s she was geared up to bear the hardship of breaking the coloration barrier in tennis.

Breaking the Color Barrier
Gibson had a powerful best friend: four-time U.S. Singles and doubles champion Alice Marble. The USLTA eventually allowed Gibson to play inside the 1950 Nationals while Marble intervened on her behalf. Gibson misplaced her first healthy of the tournament, however the front were made. Over the following several years Gibson rose in the USLTA ratings (9th in 1952, seventh in 1953). After a yr of touring the sector, gambling unique occasions for the U.S. State Department, Gibson staged a complete-scale assault at the tennis world in 1956. That year she received the French Open in each singles and doubles.