BILLIE JEAN KING: 50 YEARS EMPOWERING WOMEN’S SPORTS

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Tennis legend Billie Jean King’s work isn’t finished yet. This week, as she celebrates 50 years of championing female athletes through the Women’s Sports Foundation (WSF), she reflects on the impact her organization has had since its founding.

Launched a year after King’s famous “Bat­tle of the Sex­es” vic­to­ry against Bob­by Rig­gs, WSF has turned a mod­est $5,000 invest­ment into over $100 mil­lion to sup­port women’s and girls’ sports.

“When you’re read­ing his­to­ry, it seems to fly by. But when you’re liv­ing it, it’s slow and tough,” said King, 80. “It takes patience, per­sis­tence, and pas­sion to achieve your goals. If you don’t have those, you won’t make it.”

King, a 12-time Grand Slam win­ner, became the first indi­vid­ual female ath­lete to receive the Con­gres­sion­al Gold Medal last month in hon­or of her relent­less fight for equal pay in ten­nis. Her efforts led to the U.S. Open becom­ing the first major tour­na­ment to offer equal prize mon­ey for both men and women in 1973. WSF has since invest­ed more than $100 mil­lion in sports pro­grams, research, and advo­ca­cy.

While King has seen mon­u­men­tal progress in women’s sports, she acknowl­edges that there is still work to be done. One key area for improve­ment: the low num­ber of female coach­es at the high­est lev­els of sports.

“Noth­ing would be bet­ter than not need­ing the foun­da­tion any­more, but unfor­tu­nate­ly, we still do,” King said. “Women and girls are still far behind. There’s so much left to accom­plish.”

The WSF will cel­e­brate its 50th anniver­sary with a gala in New York on Wednes­day, hon­or­ing the 1999 U.S. wom­en’s World Cup-win­ning soc­cer team. This team is cred­it­ed with reshap­ing the land­scape of women’s sports for­ev­er. Julie Foudy and her team­mates advo­cat­ed for bet­ter pay and work­ing con­di­tions, lay­ing the ground­work for the U.S. nation­al team’s his­toric law­suit against U.S. Soc­cer two decades lat­er.

Foudy believes today’s female ath­letes are more pre­pared than ever to take on the role of activist.

“These ath­letes are not just focused on win­ning cham­pi­onships and medals. The most impor­tant thing for them now is social jus­tice, rights, and free­dom,” Foudy said.