Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, February 7, 1993 TAG: 9302070217
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: A-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: The Washington Post
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
TENNIS GREAT ARTHUR ASHE DEAD AT 49
Arthur Ashe Jr., 49, who rose from the segregated tennis courts of Richmond to become No. 1 in the world at his game and an influential activist on sports and social issues, died Saturday of pneumonia, a com plication of AIDS, at New York Hospital in Manhattan.His physician, Dr. Henry W. Murray, said Ashe's family asked that all questions about the circumstances of his death be postponed until today.
In 1968 and 1975, Ashe was ranked No. 1 among the world's tennis players. His triumph in 1975 at Wimbledon, after which he discreetly raised a symbolic clenched fist to a friend, was a landmark of black athletic achievement.
Among the first black athletes to urge other blacks in sports to use their success to promote civil rights at home and abroad, he helped get South Africa banned from the Davis Cup tournament in 1970 and thereafter `America has lost a great hero.' B1. because of apartheid.
In addition, he was a television commentator, a contributor of columns to The Washington Post and the author of a well regarded three-volume history of black athletes.
After years filled with events of electrifying drama - on the court and off - Ashe found himself unwillingly in the public spotlight again last April, when he announced he had AIDS.
Appearing frail and sometimes emotional at a televised news conference, he said he believed he contracted the HIV virus that causes AIDS from a blood transfusion after heart bypass surgery in 1983.
A heart attack he had suffered in 1979 had forced his retirement from tennis. He suffered a second heart attack last September, and in between he had undergone two bypass operations.
The story of Ashe's rise from the segregation of his native Richmond to the top of what had been the lily-white world of tournament tennis is one of the great legends of modern sports and social history.
To an admiring public, his story exemplified the triumph of ability and character over obstacles, and it formed part of the stream of progress running through the history of the nation in the latter part of this century.
Ashe's father was a city playground caretaker who operated a landscaping business, and Ashe began playing tennis at Brookfield Park, the segregated playground next door to his family's house.
In 1968, he won the first U.S. Open championship. In 1970 he won the Australian Open, and five years later, in one of the most memorable matches in tennis history, he defeated the heavily favored Jimmy Connors to win the men's singles championship at Wimbledon.
A fateful change in his life came on July 31, 1979, when he suffered his first heart attack. He had two bypass operations, in 1979 and 1983.
He later said doctors were certain that he contracted the HIV virus from one of those operations, with a 95 percent probability it was the second.
Indications that news articles were being prepared about his condition led to the hastily called April 8, 1992, news conference in which he announced he had AIDS.
He remained active; his September 1992 heart attack came shortly after taking part in a demonstration in Washington for Haitian refugees.
Ashe's uncle, Roosevelt "Rudy" Cunningham of Ettrick, near Petersburg, said Saturday, "God takes care of good people."
"He was a family man. He was a martyr. He was a man among men. Everything he did he did with grace. I'm real proud of him."
Cunningham, Ashe's mother's brother, said, "We were prepared" for the end, in part because Ashe had telephoned him about two weeks ago from a New York hospital. Ashe was released the following day after a week-long stay for treatment of pneumonia but returned to the hospital on Friday after complaining of being "hot and cold," Cunningham said.
Cunningham said Ashe's brother Johnny had flown Saturday from his home in Jacksonville, N.C., to be at Arthur's bedside, but relatives said he arrived too late.
Dorothy Brown of Richmond, an aunt, said, "I'm sure he suffered, but he never, ever complained." Brown said. When she spoke with him last fall, shortly after a heart attack, he wouldn't even admit being sick, Brown said. "There was so much he wanted to do . . . "
Gov. Douglas Wilder, who has joked of how he and teen-age friends ran 5-year-old Ashe off the tennis courts in Richmond's Brook Park, "was terribly crushed" to hear of Ashe's passing, said press secretary Glenn Davidson. Wilder ordered state flags lowered to half staff until Ashe's funeral.
"Not only have I lost a dear personal friend, America has lost a model giant," Wilder said in a written statement. "His leadership may not be confined to athletics and sports alone, for he was totally commited to improving the lives of those yet to enjoy the full fruition of rights and opportunities in this country."
The Richmond bureau contributed information to this report.