Arthur Ashe

 Arthur Robert Ashe, Jr. (July 10,
1943–February 6, 1993) was a prominent
African American tennis player who was born and
raised in Richmond, Virginia|Richmond, Virginia,
USA. He is well remembered for his efforts to
further social causes.

Ashe began to attract the attention of tennis fans
after being awarded a tennis scholarship at UCLA
in 1963. That same year, Ashe was the first
African American ever selected to the US Davis Cup
team.

In 1965, Ashe won the individual NCAA
championship. He was also a chief contributor in
UCLA's winning the team NCAA championship in the
same year. With this successful college career
behind him, Ashe quickly ascended to the upper
echelon of tennis players worldwide after turning
professional in 1966.

By 1969, most people considered Ashe to be the
best American male tennis player. He had won the
inaugural U.S. Open (Tennis)|US Open in 1968, and
had aided the US Davis Cup team to victory that
same year. Concerned that tennis pros were not
receiving winnings commensurate with the sport's
growing popularity, Ashe was one of the key
figures behind the formation of the Association of
Tennis Professionals (ATP). That year would prove
even more momentous for Ashe, when he was denied a
visa by the South African government, thereby
keeping him out of the South African Open. Ashe chose to use
this denial to publicize South Africa's apartheid
policies. In the media, Ashe called for South
Africa to be expelled from the professional tennis
circuit. In 1970, he added a second Grand Slam title to his resume by winning
the Australian Open.

In 1975, after several years of lower levels of
success, Ashe played his best season ever by
winning Wimbledon championships|Wimbledon,
unexpectedly defeating Jimmy Connors in the final.
He remains the only black player ever
to win the men's singles at Wimbledon, the US
Open, or Australian Open, and one of only two
black men to win a Grand Slam singles event (the
other being France's Yannick Noah, who won the
French Open in 1983). Ashe would ultimately obtain
his career high ranking of World No. 2 the next
year. He would play for several more years, but
after being slowed by Cardiac surgery|heart
surgery in 1979, Ashe retired in 1980.

After his retirement, Ashe took on many new tasks,
from writing for Time magazine|Time magazine to
commentating for ABC Sports, from founding the
National Junior Tennis League to serving as
captain of the US Davis Cup team. In 1983, Ashe
underwent a second heart surgery. To no one's
surprise, he was elected to the Tennis Hall of
Fame in 1985.

The story of Ashe's life turned from success to
tragedy in 1988, however, when Ashe discovered he
had contracted HIV during the blood
transfusion he had received
during one of his two heart surgeries. He and his
wife kept his illness private until April 8, 1992,
when rumors forced him to make a public
announcement that he had the disease. In the last
year of his life, Arthur Ashe did much to call
attention to AIDS sufferers worldwide. 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.

Ashe died of complications from AIDS on February
6, 1993.

The city of Richmond posthumously honored Ashe's
life with a statue on Monument Avenue, a place
that was traditionally reserved for statues of key
figures of the Confederate States of America|
Confederacy. This decision led to some
controversy in a city that was the capital of the
Confederate States of America|Confederate States
during the American Civil War.

The main stadium at the USTA National Tennis
Center in Flushing Meadows Park, where the U.S.
Open is played, is named Arthur Ashe Stadium in
his honor.

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.