Activists straddling the civil rights and power movements, he fought against racism and from the Political Center and welcomed public and private debate. Our speaker today will explore as hisearly life as well life as an intellectual. Hall teaches courses and africanAmerican History and the history of popular culture. A native of suburban chicago, he b. A. From st. Joseph in 2006 and004 and 2011. His scholarship has appeared in the journal of African American social sciencese review. His biography of arthur ashe she tennisrthur a and justice in the civil rights by johnspublished Hopkins University press. His work focuses on the intersection of popular and political culture, particularly the relationship between sport and the black Freedom Movement. So please join me in giving a hall. Hs welcome to eric [applause] eric good afternoon. Thank you so much for having me here at richmond today to talk about my book and to talk about ashe as a whole. Would like to thank the Virginia Historical society for participating in this lecture series. I am honored to be with you today to discuss the life and legacy of richmonds own, arthur ashe. I would also be remiss if i did not thank my wife, christina, for allowing me to be here today. Newborn at home, so she is bearing the burden at least for a couple of days to allow me to be here, so thank you to her. I want to begin by talking a little bit about the organization of my presentation. What im going to do is focus life inn ashes richmond and lynchburg, but i want to begin with his death in 1993 and then transition and talk a little bit about africanamerican athletes, especially in the 20th century, and then spend the bulk of my time talking about richmond and lynchburg and hopefully leave ample time in the end for any questions you may have, and i am willing to answer any questions life,any aspect of ashes whether it is civil rights or antiapartheid action or his you as an author, whatever would like to talk about, as well. So lets begin sort of at the end. Lets look at ashes viewing,s funeral, because i think we can learn about their life by looking at the ways in which they are remembered, especially at the funeral. At Virginia State flag flew half staff in 1993 on the waters of douglas wilder, the states first africanamerican governor. Hours before sunset on a cold white andwinter day, black, rich and poor, men and women, liberals and conservatives all lined the streets in downtown richmond to pay their respects to arthur ashe, a man they were membered as an international activist, a row champion tennis player, a humanitarian, a teacher, a writer, a husband, and a father. And who attended the wake the Funeral Services had no interest in sports, and many had never played tennis or watched tennis. One richmond woman braved the apartheid, the someone who had risked his own reputation to help others. Future South African president Nelson Mandela agreed. Following his own release from prison after almost 30 years intact of it he, a reporter asked who in the United States do you host most want to see question mark do you want to meet . Unequivocal was his reply. Another standing in line described arthur ashe as a role model for lack youth. He told the Richmond Times dispatch that he taught me was ok to aspire, ok to be articulate. I never had an older brother. Instead, i had a hero. Was compared to John F Kennedy and Martin Luther king, and they paid their respects to arthur ashe last night that represented a melding of ethnic groups that demonstrated the s message,ty of ashe wrote to the local press. Mourners of 5000 passed by his coffin, which had a display. Was dressed in blue with a tropical thai and appeared peaceful and at rest. Visitors left behind all kinds. F things for ashe one left behind an old tennis ball, another and inscribed and son flag, bouquets, long, arthur. The struggle continues. One writer for the Richmond Times dispatch wrote that though he was black and i was white, he was a worldclass celebrity, and i was just a guy from the local paper, but there were no gaps or barriers to separate us. Was how weeling that dealt with anyone who was fortunate enough to know him. He was right. The lines were there six hours before the funeral, dotting the sidewalks like the andsanthemums and pansies geraniums, and they sat on flatbeds and stood on the crowded roads. They carried cameras and babies and puppies, and they took annual leave from state jobs or simply shut down their businesses. Joinedtennis players charles robb, bill bradley, the reverend Jesse Jackson and others. We shall songs like overcome, the anthem of the Civil Rights Movement. Along with songs like when the saints go marching in. Funeral wereat the powerful. Arthur ashe was just plain better than most of us, said jenkins. Most athletes, jackson explained, limit themselves to achievements within their lives, but arthur found greatness beyond. Governor wilder noted how ashe used every fiber of his strength. When the service concluded, the eight pallbearers guided ashes casket to the woodlawn cemetery, where he would rest for eternity in a plot aside his mother matti e. A look at the you funeral of arthur ashe, and you really get a sense of what he meant to people, not just as an athlete, not just a richmond athlete, but someone who fought for civil rights causes throughout his life, someone who as a military and stood up or reform in other areas throughout his life. Was not the only significant athlete of the 20th century. Sthink you really and ashe legacy, i think it is important to look back, so that is what i want to do just for a second here, kind of look at ways in which historians tend to categorize and classify athletes. Historians and journalists have categorized black athletes of the 20th century in really one of two ways. On the one side, you have what the historians call lewis,dationists, joe athletes who played hard, broke records, and achieved celebrity stardom but stayed mostly silent on the issues of race. The 1940s and later in his career, but especially the 1930s, he was mostly silent on the issue of race. These men and women can to be two to the field and serving as positive role models for blacks and whites, so, in other words, may chose to pioneer through their performance. It was written at the different between me and Jackie Robinson is that he thrived on his role as a negro battling for a holiday, whereas i shy away from it. That man read me correctly. Radicalther side, militants, people like bill russell, top left, of course muhammad ali on the bottom right, and these are athletes who use their celebrity as a platform for social and political activism, and nobody personifies this category better than muhammad ali, a superbly thented locks are, one of greatest boxers of the 20th century, who changed his name just before winning the heavyweight championship in 1964. Ali inspired workingclass African Americans by joining the nation of islam, with black politics and culture, and by refusing to fight in the vietnam war. The part of what i argue in book as this kind of either or approach to classifying black athletes, either, this radicals, itist or does not take into account perhaps the vast majority and how they respond to the Civil Rights Movement, the black power movement, and responding in more moderate ways, and what i suggest in the book is that ashe responded in very nuanced and moderate ways to the various movements, says sort of who was arthur ashe . I think we know who arthur ashe was for the most part. Let me point out some of his main achievements. Ais is a picture of ashe little bit younger than we are accustomed to seeing him. Very, very thin in his early days. One of the Top International tennis players between 1966 and 1975. He was the winner of three grand slam events, the u. S. Open in 1968, just really an open in 1970, and, of course, wimbledon in 1975, where he defeated Jimmy Connors in a huge upset. As a player and also as a captain in the 1980s, he led the u. S. Davis cup team to multiple titles, and, of course, he won many other titles along the way. One writer, the very famous jim murray of the Los Angeles Times wrote that anyone who would not noth arthur ashe play would watch rembrandt paint. No one called him an artist, but he was. Off the court, it focuses, my book, war off the court. The arena of international politics, the black Freedom Movement. Historians use the term black Freedom Movement to kind of complete the variety of movements in the 1960s and 1970s, such as the Civil Rights Movement, the black power movement, the black Consciousness Movement in south really struggled at times and was more successful at other times of negotiating those poles of the movement, those that included assimilation into White Society on the other hand and black nationalism on the other. Fiercely independent and protective of his image, he walked that thin line throughout his career between can the kids and liberals, reactionaries and black power, the sports establishment and the black cause, and what i found consistently in doing my research is that he was criticized from both ends of the political spectrum with frequency. Critics would either accuse them of either doing too much for the movement or not enough for the movement. In 1992, when sports named him i want to emphasize that his approach to activism really evolved over his life. He was never static in his views. It was located somewhere between moderate and militant integration. He relied on integration. Direct engagement with white leaders in the United States and south africa and open dialogue with his opponents and direct action that was likely to succeed. Like most ordinary adoptedamericans, ashe tenants of the Civil Rights Movement for his own form of activism, and his career really spanned the civil rights era. And embracingo practiceowerment, ashe a strategy of gradualism and nonviolence, and he grew with the black Freedom Movement. So what i want to do now is that sck here and talk about ashe journey. It began right here in richmond on richmonds north side. He was born in 1943 in the middle of the second world war. In african up american in richmond presented a series of racial challenges, just like it did throughout many, many cities, north and south in the 1940s and 1950s. It have been a number of historians who have looked at cities like richmond, looked at cities in the south, and what they have argued is that places upe richmond really made communities that were connected to the wealthier white neighborhoods really only by the city limits. They were essentially separate cities, and although some of these historians and knowledge greater fluidity in richmond than in other cities like savannah or memphis, they never really reached out to middleclass blacks, leaving it a separate city, isolated by race angiography. Ashe, a young arthur Racial Discrimination was sort of part of every day life. He said, quote, i never thought much about it. Life was that way. There were certain theaters i could not go to, certain soda fountains and playgrounds that were not for me. You did not talk about it, anymore than you could not go to a certain movie because you did not know. Or you could not go to a muslim mosque. Of course, there was a good bit of racial unrest in the 1940s and 1950s, especially in a campaign to integrate public transportation, and they do talk about what they remember. One of which occurred on a city bus in the late 1940s or early experiencede ashe firsthand the reality of segregated seating. Attie wouldmother m sometimes board the bus at the unofficial line of segregation theexit to visit grandmother, and getting on the bus in richmond just like most towns in the south was an instant reminder of his plays. He says, quote, i could clearly remember the white line on the floor of the bus. It was just to the rear of the door, and i just understood i was required to stand behind it. I dont member discussing it. It was just understood. Although despite his familiarity with the white line, he did challenge it. Was recorded in a taperecorded interview how we stood up for his mother want him on the bus in the late 1940s. After boarding the bus and realizing there were no Seats Available in the front or the back, ashe, in a characteristically polite arthur ashe fashion, as a white man to mother,his seat for his and he could have been abused for the request and instead said if you have the nerve to ask me to get up and give your mother my seat, i will give her my seat. Ashes willingness to challenge the status well, he was very good at sizing up his opponent, seeing who would be best to challenge and who would be best not to challenge, part of his strategy and caution, and i eventualgets a lot of sort of philosophy and activism, i think, in some ways, im skipping ahead of it, coming from his father. I will talk a little bit about his relationship with his father, arthur ashe senior here. Son,e arthur ashe seniors they spent many of their days in brookfield park, arthur ashe senior had to work. Was a jack of all trades. He would remove weeds from gardens, clean houses, collect , kind offamilies whatever needed to be done to make ends meet. He attended Public Schools in Mecklenburg County through the eighth grade, often taking classes at night so he could work during the day. At 16 coming accepted a job as a Maintenance Man for the Richmond Railroad and eventually took a job for the city. Remain idle,one to never want to be accepting of a single job. He supplemented his income by mowing lawns, filling swimming ands, catering events, chauffeuring prominent people around town, and this is where we get to the second antidote that i want toe discuss. In a city known for racial senior affronted a lot of white men, some will help to finance the tennis career later on. He was a driver for a jewish owner of a Department Store in downtown richmond. On one occasion, he drove him to the edge of the city to purchase a piece of land. The depression had nearly bankrupted this seller, but despite the desperate need to sell his property, he was reluctant to sell his land to a jew. Man,hould have heard the arthur ashe senior said, he called mr. Fowler im her all sorts of things. After the ranting and raving, they closed the deal. Washe drive home, ashe perplexed by this and asked, how could you tolerate all of those insults without changing your disposition, and he said, i came out here to buy that land, and the end result is i owned the land. They can curse me out as much as he likes. Learned an important lesson. He said no matter what people think you are how much they try to make you feel inferior, you must always keep that angle in mind, and later on the tennis court, that strategy translated nicely for ashe, ignoring racial slurs from spectators or bad calls from linesman. He was focused on one thing, winning the match. I want to talk about the relationship between ashe and his father, particularly the way his father protected him from some of the dangers that some of the young growing up in jim crow america had to experience. Ashe senior knew that the south could be a dangerous place for black youth, and the rest a 14yearold africanamerican from chicago that with kidnapped from his uncles home, killed, lynched, thrown in the river with a called wheel wrapped around his neck, and this comes up repeatedly for historians in this was a stark reminder of what would happen to you if you looked at somebody be wrong way or said the wrong thing at the wrong time. Said, quote, my father tried to keep us out of harms way, and the possibility of harm was real. We all knew what happened to emmett till, and cast a shadow over my youth, and across america. So in part to avoid what till, he was stern, his methods bordering on overprotective. s first day at grammar school, ashe senior walked from the park with about a 10 minute track, and his father commanded that he return home exactly 10 minutes after dismissal, not a second later. Senior was an oldfashioned disciplinarian, a man who would not tolerate insubordination from his son. His view of the world in terms of child rearing left very little room for debate. On the very few occasions whena when ashe returned late or fail to do a chore, he was to get his leather belt. He would joke that only grade a lather would be used for my hide. He gave an interview where he revealed well into his 20s and 30s that he honestly believed that, quote, if i got out of line, my father would kick my. He was arrested prior to his death, and he talks in both not hingeabout it did on how mad his father would be at him, and he still thought about it. Senior of us miss commandments, and that is what he called them, commandments. No hanging around. If you do not have to be somewhere, you should be home, and ashe had plenty to do at home, including making his bed, cleaning the room, feeding the dogs, chopping wood for the fireplace, and once he finished those, he would devote his time to his schoolwork, and his father insisted that he read, that he do his work well, that he become really the best reader in school, and if you knew he wouldabout ashe, read extensively and graciously throughout his life, not just books that you would find in but all sorts of s father saidshe the following. I tried to impress upon arthur a saying that a woman told me, he told a richmond reporter in 1968. She said a seeing eye, a listening ear, a silent tong, and a faithful heart, time, and patients. You could see how that manifested later in ashes career. While he is under the watchful eye of his father, he is also becoming quite a good tennis player. Earlyins playing tennis and learns to play on the courts of brookfield park. I think i have a slide here. Of a park istcard think around the 1950s, but it shows you it is designed to show you how nice the park is, and when i show this to my students, i asked them to kind of look at the people in the pool and see if they can notice anything in common there. Even the slowest ones generally do pretty well with this. This park was not for people of color, and there were ways to beyond telling them that they were black and they could not come. One was that if you send in money to participate in a tournament, they would say your registration came too eight, or they never got the check, or that sort of thing. There were ways to keep people out. Learnedarned that ashe to play from a Young College named ron charity, and dr. Aught the attention of johnson, and his home in lynchburg is now the Tennis Courts would be in the back, and ashe with every summer for quite a number of years attended his junior Developer Program to kind aboutrned tennis, learn how to survive in a world alien to you, people of color, the working class, kind of a lesson in life, complete with the proper code of conduct. Failure to follow dr. Johnsons rule at the camp would result in a swift dismissal, something that ashe learned during his first three days. His son was assisting and try to teach ashe the eastern and western racket grips, and ashe refused to learn, believing that his mentor, charity, had already told him the proper grip. He was told, if you want charity to teach you, why dont you go home . a elder learned of ashe stubborn behavior, and senior drove to lynchburg and approached his son in ace third and fourth right matter and said dr. Johnson is teaching you now, arthur junior. You do what they say. It was that simple, ashe recalled. I always obeyed my father. Johnson and his son never had any more trouble with me, but to tell you the truth, i really did not change the rep on my back and that much. With something almost an army boot camp, johnsons boot camp was rigorous. They began the day by making their beds before tending to a number of chores, including trimming the rose bushes, weaving,the boxwoods, and worst of all, cleaning up after the dogs. When they were not doing chores, each had to show proficiency handle, a drill to improve hand and eye coordination. More of what i focus on then that is that more than a tennis camp, this junior Developer Program was really a life lesson , a life camp, offering strategies to sort of navigate the segregated world of the deep south. To succeed in the predominantly white, upperclass world of johnsonse tennis, people had to be disciplined and tough. They had to know when to fight, and more importantly, when to walk away, and johnson based his strategy, his ideas on other examples, Jackie Robinson, a great major player with the brooklyn dodgers. And johnsons selection has as much to do with his temperament as his athletic abilities, and there were great players in the 1940s that they could have chosen, but they chose robinson for a particular reason. Remained calm and composed. Turn it officials would look for any excuse to disqualify. On the court, he ordered ashe and his teammates to play any shot within two inches of the line to avoid accusations of cheating, and if it was within two inches, play it so you do not get accused of cheating. They worked hard to ignore as best they could rachel at that racial epithets, and not display it in a visible way. Find something of them displaying any kind of a motion on the tennis court, although there were some. That in the diary is that if you wanted to get into a poker game, and there was only one game in town, you had better learn to play by the prevailing rules at the table. Johnson told a reporter for the washington post, quote, i cannot use a boy unless he can control his emotions, so johnson was very, very aware of not only making these players better to be able to compete on the court with white players but teaching them the ways in which to go about doing that. Rest, they say, for arthur ashe is history. I want to take a little bit of time and go through these individual slides and talk about each one of them before i finish with the concluding remarks here. These are slides not included for particular reasons, as it s better actions on the court, in the first was his serve. He always played tennis the opposite of his personality wise. He was kind of all over the place as a tennis player, but he serves,of the quickest the fastest serve, and intimidating player from the survey and folly perspective, and then the backhand. He had an incredible back and that had been taught early on by ronald charity, who said it was the easiest stroke to learn, to engage, so his back and was something he relied on throughout his career. This is a picture from 1965 when he was at ucla. Again, with the exception of one other player, it is a team made up mostly of white players. Very, very white, at least at the collegiate level, and at the amateur level. Is top right, the tennis coach at ucla, and at led his team to the championship in 1965 and also wanted to play tennis in college, there were two places you could play in the 1960s. Usc was one, and another. There were the country clubs, and his name was conspicuously absent, and the balboa club was one of that. This is a picture of ashe embracing his father following his u. S. Open victory in 1968. He became the first amateur to when the u. S. Open in 1968. It was the first year that the u. S. Championships, the u. S. Nationals, were at open tournament. These are two pictures where i focused the book, where i look ashes antiapartheid activism. He makes a visit, and you see him interacting with local use youths, and there are some that talk about selling out and really engaging with the white government, but, of course, there were others who were very happy he was there, and not just there but engage in conversations with black ofrnalists and visiting some the townships outside the central city. s most famous on the tennis court was his victory over Jimmy Connors at wimbledon. One reporter said that coming into wimbledon, he had about as much chance as ice cream in a furnace to defeat Jimmy Connors, this shows what intellectual athlete he was treated he really planned well for connors. It as at approached fastball pitcher in baseball on at theirning and career withdrew a choke at their opponent, so he played a yoyo game against him and really outsmarted his opponent, and here throughout the 20th century, africanamerican athletes had been labeled not intellectual, and the way to win with two out strategize him, and this was a case where he out strategize a much, much better upon in terms of raw ability, was also involved in many activities, way too many to mention here today. Testifying before the united nations. He was one of the founders of athletes against apartheid, and you see other people there, asry belafonte and others, well, and at the bottom right, he is arrested in 19 85 following a demonstration outside a South African embassy. It would be the first time he was arrested but not the last time. And, of course, when i ask my students, when i ask people who , i say, whatashe do you know about arthur ashe, and they tell me he was a tennis player who died of aids, and his antiapartheid activism is missing from their description, and this is a press conference in which he revealed to the world in 1992 that he was not only hivpositive but also suffering from fullblown aids. Of course, he would die about a year later in february 1993, and he was named Sports Illustrated sportsman of the year. Before i conclude, i would like to have a couple of things. First, i just want to emphasize a few things that i found interesting in my research and things that kind of stuck with me and continued with me as i move forward. Was one of thehe most deeply intellectual individuals i have ever come across as an athlete but as an individual, period. He was a voracious reader. All kinds of things, newspapers, academic books, government reports, monographs, things that i could not pay students to read nowadays. He had this great intellectual curiosity. He loved to debate. He loved to engage in these with of back and forth people, and i think perhaps most importantly, he really understood the issues. He could engage in debates with ordinary people and engage in debates with professors at universities, anthropologists at universities. Tell when he was up there speaking. He could have easily been a professor. In fact, he did teach a couple of college classes. Another thing i wanted to mention that stuck with me as he lived in a very challenging time, a time where you really could not afford not to make a statement or not afford to take a stance on a particular issue. Age sort of his coming out party as an activist emerged in 1968, the same year as Bobby Kennedys assassination, the same year as kings assassination, the riots in chicago, and his career really extended into the black power era, where Mainstream Media would show these images of black panthers in oakland or carmichael giving speeches throughout the United States, and his views evolved as a movement evolved, so i want to end with a question i have been asked quite frequently when i have done appearances, lectures, likests, radio, and things that, and the question i am always asked is what would ashe think about all the recent acts of disobedience on the courts and on the field of american sport . What would he think of all of these athletes taking a stand with all of the events in ferguson and baltimore and cleveland and other places . What would he sort of make of that . And what i always respond with is that is a very difficult question to answer, a because i am not arthur ashe. Kind of whatr less he was thinking at certain times throughout his career, but he died in 1983, and his views likely would have evolved since 80. Edknow he would not have risk arrest, but then he was twice arrested. I think i can fairly affirmatively say that he would appreciate athletes or anybody for that matter for taking a stand, regardless of what that stand would be. Anyone who would take a stand over no stand at all, and the example i gave is in the 1970s when gary player, the golfer, was being asked about apartheid, he did not want to talk about it at all. Ashe would say in the press, if he is in favor of apartheid, i would rather know that then have him simply not answer the question at all. Secondly though, ashe did not support on court demonstrations throughout his career. He cannot think of a moment when he engage in major action on the tennis court himself. He would often prefer to engage activismtivist behind the scenes or at press conferences. He did not engage in demonstrations like these athletes engage in, but i think most importantly, the thing i keep coming back to over time is i believe would really encourage athletes today, whether it is lebron james, direct rose, the st. Louis rams, whoever it may be to really study the issues at heart of whatever their protests are, that he would want them to focus on the larger issues at hand, issues of poverty, the high unemployment rate, housing, Police Community relations, access to communities and that they should be wellversed in those topics before they make a stand, or if they do, they should be able to answer some questions with some substance on different issues. So with that said, i thank you very much for listening to me, and i am happy to entertain any questions you may have about any any questions you may have on any aspect of ashes life. [applause] did he coach at west point . A coach athe was west point right after he graduated from ucla. He was a data processor. And he talks about that experience fairly vividly, especially receiving phone calls from a number of parents of people who died in the vietnam war and hearing their stories, but, yes, there was time that he spent coaching at west point. As a teenager in richmond when he was basically unknown, richmond was an excellent example of his character, and he picked up the phone and called the tennis professional at the country club of virginia and said, i would like to play in the tournament. Fine. What is your name . He let two or three by, and and hecalled him back, said, did you know i was black . And he about spit all over himself. He said, look. I am not going to cause you any embarrassment. I will be glad to withdraw. And he said, please do, please do. I will lose my job, so as luck would have it, a few days later, the state of West Virginia had an 18 and under tennis tournament, and the best wife tennis player in virginia from richmond, who will remain nameless today, played arthur ashe in West Virginia, and 61,r ashe beat him 61, 61. [applause] he spoke of his relationship with his father. Active in there civil rights and apartheid issues later on, how did that relationship change . Part of thek relationship with his father when he was younger was that his father knew that he was young and not in any kind of position of power, did not have any kind of platform at the time to really stand up on a number of issues, but as i think he grew, the tennis player, as he started to win tournaments and became a national player, as he establish this platform for activism, his father understood that he could really do good by speaking out on these issues, and i do get the sense i mean, they had a very, very strong relationship throughout their lives are you he continued to rely on his hers counsel throughout, very, very strong relationship throughout their lives. He continued to rely on his fathers counsel throughout. He would rather go meet with the board of ibm to talk about their hiring policies of south africa rather than stand on a Street Corner with a sign. He would really insist upon meeting with people whenever he could as opposed to direct action campaigns. I know that his father would there was angry instance when he walked up a court against a player, and many people would probably want to walk off the court, but he understood he had to do what he did. Excellent presentation, professor hall. I was honored to be a classmate of arthur ashe at the university of california los angeles. He ranks with two others of the effigy of distinguished athletes who contributed to humanity. The other two are jackie , andson and johnny wooden i am glad that you mentioned his goter and that you finally to his army service, because arthur ashe, one of the titles that he most deserves is patriot. When hed on active duty did not have to, and i asked him, why . My father always told me, it was my duty. [applause] eric and he had a deep Family History of relatives who had served in the army. He had relatives who served during world war ii. His brother served turned the vietnam war, and he talked about , it repeatedly and memoirs and interviews, he loved playing for the Davis Cup Team, it is the Davis Cup Team, it is point usa, and i think in some ways thats why he liked john mcenroe more than he liked Jimmy Connors, because mcenroe was similar to that and that he played for the Davis Cup Team because he wanted to play for his country and not the amount of money you could make in this or that, but, yes, his service is often not talked about in pieces done about ashe. About his tennis and the fact that he died of aids, and some of this is obscured. I am dr. Johnsons granddaughter. , but i wantrom d. C. To say thank you for sharing that part of the story. There are many stories beyond and i also am a benefactor. My siblings and i played at that very cap until my grandfather got sick and died, and he, in fact, sent home one of my brothers because he had that kind of mcenroe. [laughter] so thank you, and great story. I feel like this story is not told. The death of the story is really not explored as it could have been, but we appreciate your thoughts. Eric thank you. I should mention two books. When you talk about john wooden, there was a book that just came out, but a book done by john really looks that at him in a historical context, which is a pretty good read, and there is a biography of dr. Jonathan. How well it is done, i do not know. A lot more historical work needs hebe done on him, because was a mentor not only of arthur ashe but of gibson, which people do not talk about that much, and many, many others. Right. Sir . Many africanamerican athletes speak about the influence of their mother. You have not mentioned one word. sure. Part of that is that she passed away when he was very young, five years old. Peopley, there are some a sportswriter, who particularly looked at his father and mother and said look, he had a lot more in common with his mother in terms of personality than he did with his father. His mother really encouraged him to read, and not just read superman or comic books but to really read important things and to read alongside him. Did notmost part, ashe have the kind of Strong Female mentors you tend to see with these athletes. Because his mother passed away and his father raised him. Eventually, his father would remarry, and growing up, he would always cite as is mentors his father, ronald charity, dr. Johnson, and he would cite Pancho Gonzales when he started playing for the team, morgan come but his mother, unfortunately, died too early. Way kilos sin. Way kilos sin. Way too soon. There was a professor of mine at the university of virginia, a brilliant man, who went on to teach at princeton and stanford, wrote a biography of Jackie Robinson, and i am wondering, how did arnold get to know arthur ashe, or how was that connection made so that he assisted him in the writing of the memoir, and did you interview arnold for your book . i did not interview him. There was a time where it was somewhere i was going to be, i think purdue or Something Like that, and i could not make it for some reason or he couldnt really kind of missed each other. Otherwise, that would have happened. I am not sure of the specific story of how they met. In the 1980she knew him. There were professors at universities at the ivy league and other places, so my guess is he probably would have made that connection, either through a talk that he would have given on campus or interaction or an event or something to that effect, because he considered professors and people of African American studies scholars among a very close group of friends, so i am guessing that is when the meeting took place or where the introduction took place, but i do not know exactly. High. A great presentation. Of the city ofe richmond towards its native son, theur ashe, change through 1950s, 1960s, 1970s, 1980s, as he became more excepted and popular and segregation and jim crow ended . Eric this is something he talks about quite a bit in the memoirs. In richmond, having to deal with the segregation and some of the problems of being a person of color in the city, he talks about leaving richmond for st. Louis in 1961, kind of not looking back in the rearview mirror, kind of wanting to leave behind the negative aspects of richmond that he remembered and find this better place, but i think this kind of reconciliation with richmond happen to really and the 1960s. There is an arthur ashe day in 1966 in richmond, where the town comes out to support him, and i think very, very gradually over time, he kind of comes to appreciate the good aspects of the communities in richmond, comes to see some of the benefactors who had helped him all along the way and really understanding what richmond like towner southern town is a complicated place for a person of color, and i think he saw some of the strides that theyn in town, and i think had fully reconciled with the city by the time of his death. Over here. Just wondering. Were there other sports that arthur tried before settling on tennis . yes. He was a big baseball fan, and he was actually quite a good baseball player, and he tried to play baseball for his High School Baseball team. He was a very fast runner and a very, very good player, and it one point, the principle of his High School Kind of took him out i know your teacher, meet with the principal, and in no uncertain terms, youre not to play in sports other than tennis for this school going forward, because if you hurt yourself sliding into second base come youre going to be no good on the tennis court, and we have enough black Baseball Players at this point. We do not have any black tennis players that are at an elite level, so its nice little prodding was there. Sir . Yes, good afternoon. My name is gary flowers, and i agree with dr. Johnsons granddaughter that we appreciate your presentation, and it could have been a lot more in depth. Fatherortunate to have a put a racket in my hand. I was not that good, but it was the arthur ashe junior Tennis League that he began in battery park, which got a lot of kids off of the street and exposed them to a sport outside of traditional baseball, football, basketball, so i thought that should have been explored today, a far greater story that we have to tell. Eric yes, there are all kinds of stories about when he was a tennis player, when he retired, going into communities and working particularly with people of color and teaching the game two children that really were not experienced with it, that kind of grew up playing basketball or football or whatever, but there really was this effort not just in the richmond area but everywhere to teach africanamericans to play tennis, to draw more interest in the sport that was, quite frankly, at the time and embarrassment in terms of its racial makeup. Excellent presentation, and i wanted to ask you, who were arthur ashes best friends in the tennis world and maybe other sports, and did you interview people like donald dell and stan having come to the ranks of the tennis world with the likes of arthur ashe . Eric he had a number of friends that kept coming up and up. Donald was the big one. His davis cup captain when he started with a Davis Cup Team, and his manager and close personal confidant, and he was 72 traveled with ashe to south africa when he and he was somebody who traveled with ashe to south africa, and he took some slack for that because he was a white man, and some are wondering why he would hire a for his career, and he would point to causes, so dell was one of them. When he was married in the late jeanne i think his wife took on that role, but beyond that, stan smith was a great friend of his. Together andrds would travel throughout vietnam together, traveling to africa together, and there is a story with stan smith, he is an africa, and ashe is being mobbed and cheered by the month, and they were in tanzania, and smith saying,ing there everywhere we go, i am like the evil, white person, and he said, we go to thehen deep south, you can be the great white hope. He had a very good core group of people. Cliff drysdale. He got along fairly well with thank you all. Thank you. [applause] [captions Copyright National cable satellite corp. 2015] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. Visit ncicap. Org] announcer bank you are watching American History tv all weekend, every weekend on cspan3. To join the conversation, like us on facebook. American history tv is featuring cspans original series first ladies image and influence at 8 00 p. M. On sunday nights throughout the rest of this year. Cspan produced the series and cooperation with the historical association. Through conversations with experts, video tours, and questions from cspan audience, we tell the stories of american 45 first ladies. Ellen edith wilson on first ladies. This is about 90 minutes. Susan swain this is the Woodrow Wilson house in washington, d. C. , the home of our 28th president and former first Lady Edith Wilson after they left the white house in 1921. Youll be seeing more of it over the next two hours as we tell the story of the two Wilson Administration first ladies, ellen and edith. Susan swain ellen and woodrow met in their 20s and their love for each other was reflected in passionate letters