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3 Billie Jean King, Inc.: womenSports, the Women's Sports Foundation, and World Team Tennis
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Chapter Three Billie Jean King, Inc. womenSports, the Women’s Sports Foundation, and World Team Tennis Billie Jean King was already approaching thirty when she beat Bobby Riggs in the Battle of the Sexes in 1973, and she must have known that her playing days would soon be drawing to a close. Her first retirement—after winning Wimbledon in 1975—didn’t stick, but she was already devoting increasing time to a variety of business and charitable undertakings while cutting back on her tennis schedule. “I still feel that playing my best on a given day, I can win every match—provided I can concentrate totally on my tennis,” she said in early 1976. “As my life now stands, I will devote four months a year totally to tennis with the New York Sets in World Team Tennis competition . The balance of the year will be filled with business commitments, womenSports, television commentary with ABC and time off.” Reflecting on her options, she said, “It’s really great that the sport has produced enough to allow me . . . this choice. I wish this was true for everyone.”1 Billie Jean King was always clear on the importance of women being able to make a living as athletes: after all, this was the whole thrust behind the es- 76 Billie Jean King, Inc. tablishment of the women’s professional tennis tour in the early 1970s. King fervently believed that women’s professional opportunities should not be limited to tennis: “Little boys have so many opportunities. They can picture themselves being a baseball player, basketball player, hockey—wherever professional opportunities are open to boys, that’s what they can dream about in a realistic way.” Her childhood memories were far less expansive: “When I was a little kid, I had to follow Mickey Mantle’s batting average. I never had any woman to emulate in politics or anything.” She wanted little girls to dare to dream on equal-opportunity terms and proudly offered her career as a model and inspiration.2 This is where Billie Jean King’s story and that of Title IX converge. In her own career she was working toward the same general goal as the legislation : challenging and eradicating all forms of discrimination in athletics so women could finally have a sporting chance to play on equal terms with men. To accomplish this goal took education, advocacy, political engagement , and even entrepreneurship. Just as she had done in the Battle of the Sexes, Billie Jean King dovetailed her personal and professional priorities with building support for women’s sports in the society at large. Not coincidentally , many of her actions also benefitted Billie Jean King personally, either financially or in terms of enhancing the public visibility and celebrity she craved. To her mind, this was a win-win situation: she got to pursue a lucrative career while also acting as a role model for women athletes everywhere . Not surprisingly, her unbridled ambition and drive also opened her to criticism that she was mainly out for herself. After her victory in the much-hyped Battle of the Sexes, Billie Jean King suddenly found herself flush with cash. Even though the money available in the 1970s seems like peanuts compared to today’s multimillion-dollar tournament purses and lucrative endorsement contracts, its scale was unprecedented at the time, especially for a female athlete. The Wall Street Journal estimated that King grossed $500,000 in 1973 from her tournament winnings, the residuals from the Bobby Riggs match, as well as a string of endorsements that included Adidas, Wilson tennis rackets, Colgate toothpaste , Aquanet hairspray, Phase III soap, Bonnie Doon socks, and Sunbeam hair curlers. The following year her income approached $1 million. Billie Jean King’s “open pursuit of money and fame” appalled many in the tennis establishment and subjected her to inevitable criticism and resentment, which she simply shrugged off as sour grapes: “They love you when you’re coming up. But they don’t like winners. And they especially don’t like me [54.198.45.0] Project MUSE (2024-03-28 21:09 GMT) 77 Billie Jean King, Inc. because I talk about money all the time.” She concluded triumphantly, “I’m mercenary. I’m a rebel.”3 Her coconspirator in these mercenary rebellions—what could easily be called “Billie Jean King, Inc.”—was her lawyer husband, Larry, or as he unapologetically signed autographs “Mr. Billie Jean King.” As he said in 1980, “You’ve got to make a...