Don Budge

Tennis Player

• Born: June 13, 1915
• Birthplace: Oakland, California
• Died: January 26, 2000
• Place of death: Scranton, Pennsylvania

Sport: Tennis

Early Life

John Donald Budge was born on June 13, 1915, in Oakland, California. A shy redhead with freckles, Don grew up in a family of modest means, in which all members were athletically inclined. His father, John Budge, was a former world-class soccer player with the renowned Glasgow Rangers, before he emigrated from Scotland for health reasons. As a boy, Don had no interest in tennis. In fact, he scorned it. He was good at baseball, though, and was a tough left-handed hitter, a fact that later accounted for his remarkable backhand strokes in tennis. Whenever he started to play tennis, the tall, lanky boy soon got bored and headed out to the ballpark. Don’s older brother, Lloyd, however, was an avid tennis player. One evening over dinner, when Don was fifteen years old, Lloyd chided him until Don impulsively agreed to enter the California state boys’ championship that was to be held the following week.

The Road to Excellence

After only one week of practice, Don entered his first tennis tournament and won. He was exhilarated. Three years later he went on to win both the senior and junior California championships in one season. Even in those early days as an amateur, Don was an impressive player—steady yet explosive. He was tall and slender yet extremely strong. His strength in tennis was his sustained power. His backhand had a freedom of motion that was envied by every player who ever watched him. Originating from his baseball days, his mighty backhand stroke was guided by his left hand.

By the time he was nineteen, Don’s game sufficiently impressed Walter Pate, the man in the best position to help Don’s career. Pate thought Don was the player who could help bring the Davis Cup back to his team. When Pate was made team captain, he accepted on the condition that Don be part of the team, ahead of the older players. Don began working on his problems as a player. Pate felt his forehand needed work. Champion Fred Perry gave Don tips for his footwork. Fellow teammate Sidney Wood straightened out his forehand and encouraged him to choose one grip instead of experimenting with many.

The Emerging Champion

Don’s tennis skills were still in the developmental stage in 1935, when Pate entered him in the Davis Cup singles against Australia. Leg cramps nearly finished him in a draining four-hour match against Jack Crawford, but in a last-ditch effort, he won, and his team went on to play the British for the Cup. The team, however, lost. Soon there was no one around who could compete with Don, except Perry, who shortly turned pro. This left Don to lead the way to another Davis Cup. First, however, he had to beat the German Gottfried von Cramm, in a match considered by many as the most dramatic and finest Davis Cup encounter ever played.

During the match, von Cramm received a long-distance call from none other than Adolf Hitler, who wanted von Cramm to restore national honor and demonstrate his racial superiority. The call put undue pressure on the German player, known for his anti-Nazi sympathies. When, in the end, Don won the match, von Cramm embraced his opponent and declared the match the finest he had ever played, and within the year, von Cramm was interned in a Nazi prison. Don set records as the first player ever to win the French, British, Australian, and American national championships in a single year. Thus, Don completed the first Grand Slam in tennis history.

Continuing the Story

Late in 1938, the year Don scored his unprecedented Grand Slam, American sportswriters voted him the country’s top athlete, amateur or professional. In succeeding years, only Rod Laver matched his achievement by completing a Grand Slam in 1962 and 1969. Consequently, Don was more than ready to turn pro. For three glorious years he went on to dominate the pros just as he had the amateurs. He toured with Ellsworth Vines, then Perry, Bobby Riggs and Frank Kovacs, and finally Bill Tilden.

Soon after, Pearl Harbor cut short Don’s professional career, when he joined the Air Force. Five years later, when he returned to the grass courts, his game was not the same. He was still young—only thirty-one—but no longer able to take on Riggs during their two-month tour. Don’s brief tennis career had come to a close. Many believe Don was one of the best ever even though his achievement lasted only a few short years. In those years, Don’s triumphs included the return of the Davis Cup to the United States in 1937, after a decade of losses to France and England; his Grand Slam a year later; and his invincibility at Wimbledon and Forest Hills, where he rarely ever lost even a set. Despite all this, Don claimed the greatest thrill of his life was meeting Pablo Casals, a cello virtuoso, who gave Don a private concert in return for the pleasure of watching him play tennis.

Summary

During his two all-conquering years, Don Budge was the world’s top tennis amateur at Wimbledon and Forest Hills. He was the first player ever to win the French, British, Australian, and American national championships in a single year. His two-year reign at the top, in which he did not lose a single match that mattered, stands as one of the great all-time sports achievements.

Bibliography

Collins, Bud. Total Tennis: The Ultimate Tennis Encyclopedia. Toronto: Sport Media, 2003.

Deford, Frank, Mark Mravic, and Richard O’Brien. “What Might Have Been.” Sports Illustrated 92, no. 5 (February 7, 2000): 32-33.

Finn, Robin. “Don Budge, First to Win Tennis’s Grand Slam, Dies at Eighty-four.” The New York Times, January 27, 2000, p. B7.