Evonne Goolagong Cawley

Evonne Fay Goolagong Cawley (née Goolagong; born 31 July 1951) is an Australian former world No. 1 tennis player.

In 1965, Vic Edwards, the proprietor of a tennis school in Sydney, was tipped off by two of his assistants, travelled to Barellan to take a look at the young Goolagong, and immediately saw her potential.

He persuaded her parents to allow her to move to Sydney, where she attended Willoughby Girls High School.

There, she completed her School Certificate in 1968 and, at the same time, lived with the family of Edwards, who had become her legal guardian, coach, and manager.

Goolagong was one of the world's leading players in the 1970s and early 1980s.

At the age of 19, she won the French Open singles and the Australian Open doubles championships (the latter with Margaret Court).

She won the women's singles tournament at Wimbledon in 1971.

She represented Australia in three Fed Cup competitions, winning the title in 1971, 1973 and 1974, and was Fed Cup captain for three consecutive years.

Goolagong was named Australian of the Year in 1971.

Despite reaching the final at her first two appearances in 1971 and 1972, after 1973 Goolagong did not compete at the Roland-Garros for a decade.

She was appointed as a Member of the Order of the British Empire in 1972 and as an Officer of the Order of Australia in 1982.

Goolagong reached four consecutive US Open singles finals, from 1973 to 1976, but lost them all.

She is the only player in U.S. Championships history to have lost four consecutive finals.

Goolagong made seven consecutive finals at the Australian Open, winning three titles in a row.

The French Tennis Federation banned all World Team Tennis contracted players from the 1974 event, with the player's unions instigating legal action against the French authorities.

As Jimmy Connors and Goolagong were the reigning Australian Open champions, they spearheaded the legal action as they were being deprived of the opportunity to attain the tennis calendar Grand Slam as a result of the decision.

Connors admitted this was a huge distraction and later wrote both he and Goolagong were "hung out to dry".

Goolagong was ranked No. 1 in the world in women's tennis for two weeks in 1976, but it was not reported at the time because incomplete data was used to calculate the rankings.

In 1980, she became the first mother to win Wimbledon in 66 years.

Goolagong went on to win 14 Grand Slam tournament titles: seven in singles (four at the Australian Open, two at Wimbledon and one at the French Open), six in women's doubles, and one in mixed doubles.

After retiring from professional tennis in 1983, Goolagong played in senior invitational competitions, endorsed a variety of products, worked as a touring professional, and held sports-related leadership roles.

Goolagong boycotted the event even after the ban was lifted, but returned in 1983 for her final Grand Slam singles appearance.

She lost in the last thirty-two to Chris Evert and did not compete in any further Grand Slam singles events.

Her last appearance at Grand Slam level came at the following 1983 Wimbledon Championships when she partnered Sue Barker to a first-round defeat in the doubles, having withdrawn from the singles event earlier.

Her career win/loss percentage was 81.0% (704–165).

Her win/loss performance in all Grand Slam singles tournaments was 82.1% (133–29), at the French Open 84.2% (16–3), at Wimbledon 83.3% (50–10), at the US Open 81.3% (26–6), and at the Australian Open 80.4% (41–10).

Goolagong was inducted into the Sport Australia Hall of Fame in 1985, the International Tennis Hall of Fame in 1988, and the Aboriginal Sporting Hall of Fame in 1989.

She leads the Goolagong National Development Camp for Indigenous boys and girls, which encourages Indigenous youth to stay in school.

Evonne is the third of eight children from an Australian Aboriginal (Wiradjuri) family.

Her father, Ken Goolagong, was a sheep shearer and her mother, Melinda, was a homemaker.

Evonne was born in Griffith, New South Wales, and grew up in the small country town of Barellan.

Goolagong grew up during the time of the stolen generations in Australia, and was directly impacted by it:

"Lucky not to be taken away by the stolen generation because I've had to hide a few times under the bed. We visited my cousin in Griffith, which is where I was born, in the mission there. Every time a shiny car would come down the road, my mum used to say 'you better run and hide, the welfare man's going to take you away.' So I remember hiding very nervously under the bed, 'cause I didn't want to get taken away."

Despite the widespread disadvantage and prejudice Aboriginal people experienced in Australia, Goolagong was able to play tennis in Barellan from childhood, thanks to an area resident, Bill Kurtzman, who saw her peering through the fence at the local courts and encouraged her to come in and play.

This was discovered in December 2007, 31 years later.

With seven championships, Goolagong is 12th on the women's list of all-time singles Grand Slam winners, and ended her career with 86 singles titles.

She took singles and doubles titles at the Australian Open and Wimbledon and singles and mixed doubles titles at the French Open.

She never won the US Open.

She won seven Grand Slam singles titles in her career, reaching a total of 18 Grand Slam singles finals.

She was the second woman to hold the top spot, but the 16th at the time she was finally recognised.