Billie Jean King

There is no life for girls in team sports past Little League. I got into tennis when I realized this, and because I thought golf would be too slow for me, and I was too scared to swim.

I wanted to use sports for social change.

In the seventies we had to make it acceptable for people to accept girls and women as athletes. We had to make it okay for them to be active. Those were much scarier times for females in sports.

When they take surveys of women in business, of the Fortune 500, the successful women, 80% of them, say they were in sports as a young woman.

Women’s sports is still in its infancy. The beginning of women’s sports in the United States started in 1972, with the passage of Title 9 for girls to finally get athletic scholarships.

Sports teaches you character, it teaches you to play by the rules, it teaches you to know what it feels like to win and lose-it teaches you about life.

Sports are a microcosm of society.

Tennis is a perfect combination of violent action taking place in an atmosphere of total tranquillity.