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Article: APPRECIATION: Althea Gibson, To Serve with Love
- Article from:
- The Crisis
- Article date:
- November 1, 2003
- Author:
CopyrightCopyright Crisis Publishing Company, Incorporated Nov/Dec 2003. Provided by ProQuest LLC. (Hide copyright information)
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Whenever I saw Althea. she always asked me if I was practicing my serve. It was one of those dreaded questions, like your grandmother asking you if you'd been eating your vegetables. You knew you should be doing it, you knew they asked only because they cared and you knew that you wouldn't hear the end of it if the answer was "no." I now understand what she was asking me. And my answer is a resounding, "yes."
For so long, I had the expectation of being the next Althea resting on my shoulders. I thought that expectation was to win titles and Grand Slam tournaments, as she did. Althea, a native of Silver, S.C., in 1950, was the first African American to compete in the national tennis ...