Billie Jean King
Billie Jean King (née Moffitt; born November 22, 1943), also known as BJK, is an American former world No. 1 tennis player. King won 39 Grand Slam titles: 12 in singles, 16 in women's doubles, and 11 in mixed doubles. King was a member of the victorious United States team in seven Federation Cups and nine Wightman Cups. For three years, she was the U.S. captain in the Federation Cup.
Billie Jean King
5 ft 4+1⁄2 in (1.64 m)
United States
1968
1990
Right-handed (one-handed backhand)
$1,966,487[1]
1987 (member page)
695–155 (81.76%)
129 (67 during open era)
No. 1 (1966, Lance Tingay)
W (1968)
W (1972)
87–37 (as shown on WTA website)[1]
No. 1 (1967)
W (1972)
11
W (1968)
W (1963, 1966, 1967, 1976, 1977, 1978, 1979) (as player)
W (1976, 1996, 1999, 2000) (as captain)
King is an advocate of gender equality and has long been a pioneer for equality and social justice.[2] In 1973, at the age of 29, she famously won the "Battle of the Sexes" tennis match against the 55-year-old Bobby Riggs.[3] King was also the founder of the Women's Tennis Association and the Women's Sports Foundation. She was instrumental in persuading cigarette brand Virginia Slims to sponsor women's tennis in the 1970s and went on to serve on the board of their parent company Philip Morris in the 2000s.
Regarded by many as one of the greatest tennis players of all time,[4][5][6][7] King was inducted into the International Tennis Hall of Fame in 1987. The Fed Cup Award of Excellence was bestowed on her in 2010. In 1972, she was the joint winner, with John Wooden, of the Sports Illustrated Sportsman of the Year award and was one of the Time Persons of the Year in 1975. She has also received the Presidential Medal of Freedom and the Sunday Times Sportswoman of the Year lifetime achievement award. She was inducted into the National Women's Hall of Fame in 1990, and in 2006, the USTA National Tennis Center in New York City was renamed the USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center. In 2018, she won the BBC Sports Personality of the Year Lifetime Achievement Award. In 2020, the Federation Cup was renamed the Billie Jean King Cup in her honor. In 2022, she was awarded the French Legion of Honour.
Early life[edit]
Billie Jean Moffitt was born in Long Beach, California, into a conservative Methodist family, the daughter of Betty (née Jerman), a housewife, and Bill Moffitt, a firefighter.[8][9] Her family was athletic; her mother excelled at swimming, and her father played basketball, baseball and ran track.[10] Her younger brother, Randy Moffitt, became a Major League Baseball pitcher, pitching for 12 years in the major leagues for the San Francisco Giants, Houston Astros, and Toronto Blue Jays.[11] She also excelled at baseball and softball as a child, playing shortstop at 10 years old on a team with girls 4–5 years older than she.[10] The team went on to win the Long Beach softball championship.[10]
She switched from softball to tennis at the age of 11,[12] because her parents suggested she should find a more 'ladylike' sport.[10] She saved her own money, $8 ($88.54 in 2022 terms), to buy her first racket.[10] She went with a school friend to take her first tennis lesson on the many free public courts in Long Beach, taking advantage of the free lessons offered by professional Clyde Walker, who worked for the City of Long Beach.[10] One of the city's tennis facilities has subsequently been named the Billie Jean Moffitt King Tennis Center.[13] As a kid playing in her first tennis tournaments, she was often hindered by her aggressive playing style.[10] Bob Martin, sportswriter for the Long Beach, Press-Telegram wrote about her success in a weekly tennis column. One of King's first conflicts with the tennis establishments and status-quo came in her youth, when she was forbidden from being in a group picture at a tournament because she was wearing tennis shorts (sewn by her mother) instead of the usual white tennis dress.[14]
King's family in Long Beach attended the Church of the Brethren, where the minister was former athlete and two-time Olympic pole-vaulting champion Bob Richards. One day, when King was 13 or 14, Richards asked her, "What are you going to do with your life?" She said: "Reverend, I'm going to be the best tennis player in the world."[15][16][17]
King attended Long Beach Polytechnic High School.[18] After graduating in 1961, she attended Los Angeles State College, now California State University, Los Angeles (Cal State LA).[12] She did not graduate, leaving school in 1964 to focus on tennis.[19] While attending Cal State, she met Larry King in a library in 1963.[10] The pair became engaged while still in school when Billie Jean was 20 and Larry 19 years old and married on September 17, 1965, in Long Beach.[20]