When Arthur Ashe was a boy, few places were as rigidly segregated in his hometown of Richmond as the city’s tennis courts. In the summer of 1952, when Ashe was nine and already showing promise as a tennis player, he participated in several tournaments at Black parks around the city. But when the future U.S. Open and Wimbledon champion attempted to register for a youth tournament at Byrd Park, a facility for white people, he was turned away.
During Ashe’s childhood, Jim Crow remained the law of the land across the South. For Black residents of Richmond, reminders of second-class citizenship were everywhere.