Our founder, Billie Jean King shares her thoughts on life, tennis, and doing the right thing.
By Becky K Lane
When Billie Jean King enters a room, the air becomes electric. People stare, whispers are heard; strangers come up to her and express their admiration and gratitude. She handles it with grace and aplomb, like she's handled the many obstacles that have been set in her path. An icon of American culture, she's won 20 Wimbledon tiles, was the first woman to earn more than $100,000 in any sport, founded the first magazine for women's sports, coached Olympic athletes to gold, and has been at the center of two of the most influential events in women's sports.
The first is the infamous "Battle of the Sexes," in which she defeated Bobby Riggs in 1973. The second, perhaps not as famous-but just as far-reaching, is her creation of the Women's Sports Foundation in 1974. King has changed the face of women's sports, and the Foundation is a testament to her continued commitment to bring equality to women and girls. Billie Jean King reflects on the Foundation, the state of women's sports, and the recent movie based on her history-making tennis match with Bobby Riggs.
Q: How did you think of starting the Women's Sports Foundation?A: It was 1974. We had just started WomenSports magazine, and I thought, "I know, we'll have a Women's Sports Foundation. We have the magazine, and that will be our forum." I thought that the next time I received an award designed to give to charity, I would use that money to start it. I got my opportunity when I was on the Gillette Cavalcade of Sports. Bob Hope was the host that night, and he said, "Billie Jean, you've won this $5,000 check to give your favorite charity." And I said "Bob, with this $5,000, I'm going to start the Women's Sports Foundation." He's actually come back to our Foundation dinner, because without that $5,000 the Women's Sports Foundation wouldn't have been started.
Q: What were the early days like?A: Well, I'm good at initiating things and getting things started, but I was playing tennis at the time so I couldn't be involved as much as I would have liked to. I want to say that Eva Auchincloss, Holly Turner and Donna de Varona are really the ones who allowed the Women's Sports Foundation to evolve in the '70s, when it was a very difficult time. They came up with a lot of the concepts that are still in place today. I remember calling Eva and saying, "We have to have a dinner in New York, and make it a celebration and media event to raise funds." But it was really Eva, Holly and Donna who came up with the different concepts that shaped the Foundation in many ways that remain today. Whether it be travel and training grants or the concept with the dinner, Donna, Eva and Holly are really the trifecta, I think we recognize them at one of our dinners to really let people know where it started.
Q: You mentioned the '70s as being a difficult time. Do you think that the young women athletes today have a sense of history about the hard work and the blood, sweat and tears that have been put in by people like you?A: I think some do and some don't. But everyone has a different experience. And their frame of reference is different from mine. They start out with higher expectations, which I think is healthy. People before me definitely had it more difficult than I did. And the younger athletes… I've had it more difficult than them. It's hard because each individual has her own experiences. That's why World TeamTennis is so very important to me. With that, we're just trying to get youngsters to understand that it's great for women to be great athletes just like the men. I mean, watch a World TeamTennis match and you will see my philosophy on life, and that is that we all work together-boys and girls-to help each other. On World TeamTennis we have two men and two women in order to have equality, and my dream is that if a little boy or little girl comes up to watch a World Team match, he or she thinks that it's absolutely normal to have boys and girls cooperate.
Q: Now there's a new movie about your experience in "The Battle of the Sexes." How were you involved with that production?A: Well, I tried to be helpful to a point, but it always depends on the writer. Jane Anderson is fabulous. You know, she wrote The Making of an American Quilt. She is one of the most creative people I've ever met. It's so interesting that they chose her before they realized that she and I are friends. I've known Jane a few years now, and when they said they found a writer for my movie and it's Jane Anderson I just started laughing. And they said, "Why are you laughing?" And I said, "Ah, she's a friend, I've known her forever, she's an amazing writer." And Holly Hunter, being an academy award winner, is the consummate professional. I've met with her on many occasions; she took tennis lessons every day to prepare for the role. She'd never played tennis, never played sports because she was never encouraged to. Now she's hooked on women's sports. So this is a new person, a new convert we have that's really on our side and would do anything to try to help us be successful. So all these wonderful things have come from the movie.
Q: What do you hope it will accomplish?A: Well, I hope parents will have their children watch it. I hope there will be a way we can get the movie out to all the schools because it's really about history. It's about social change. It's not about a tennis match; and, unless people see it, it's not going to make an impact. Distribution is very, very important. I want to make sure that it's used as a part of history, not just girl-versus-guy. My generation will be interested in it, but we need to encourage others to watch it and set up situations where they can watch it. I want to help keep the young people believing in themselves and dreaming their dreams and to also help each other along the way. And hopefully the movie will be an impetus or catalyst for maybe one young person watching it to try and make a difference, a positive difference some day. I really want to bring focus to women's sports and to show that girls are really great athletes and that we have our dreams too. And that we need to keep improving women's professional opportunities--softball, ice hockey and soccer and other women's team sports. I think that's really vital, and hopefully it will now make sense to people that men and women are really together on a team. Every chance I have to work for equality I do it.