The City College of Ney York Athletics

Frederick Johnson (1891-1963) was an inspirational tennis player, coach, teacher and Harlem native who enriched the lives of countless members of this community. Johnson was a gifted sportsman from his earliest years, but an accident from his youth claimed his left arm just above the elbow. Determined to remain active, he soon taught himself to play tennis, defying everyone’s expectations about his apparent disability. After developing his own unique style of play, Johnson eventually competed professionally.

The highlight of Johnson’s career came later in his life when he began promoting tennis in Harlem, sharing his love of the game by teaching it to others, often on the very courts in this park. For half a century, until his death in 1963, Johnson was at the forefront of the Harlem tennis scene, teaching and mentoring the area’s youth. Perhaps his most notable success was his discovery of star player Althea Gibson. Johnson gave Gibson her first lesson in the summer of 1941 and entered her in her first tournament in 1942. Under his guidance, Gibson went on to become one of tennis’s most accomplished competitors despite the segregation then prevalent in the tennis world. In 1950, Gibson became the first African-American tennis player to compete at the National Championships (later known as the U.S. Open) in Forest Hills. In 1957 and 1958, she won both the Championships at Wimbledon and the United States National Championships.

Courtesy of...
http://www.nycgovparks.org/parks/M159/