Queens Was Burning, Too
The Chaotic Spectacle of the 1977 U.S. Open
By MICHAEL STEINBERGER
Published: August 23, 2012http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/26/magazine/the-chaotic-spectacle-of-the-1977-us-open.html?_r=2&hpRenée Richards, the former Richard Raskind, who had a sex-change operation in 1975... was originally barred from competing because she refused to take a chromosome test to determine her eligibility. Richards, 43, challenged the U.S.T.A. in court. Two weeks before the Open began, a New York State Supreme Court justice ruled in her favor, a decision that is considered a landmark in the battle for transgender rights.
Before their first-round match, Virginia Wade, the reigning Wimbledon champion, told reporters, "I've practiced with a lot of 40-year-old men; if Renée beats me, she should be checked out." In the end, there was no need. Wade defeated Richards 6-1, 6-4. (Richards had more success in women's doubles, reaching the final with her partner, Betty Ann Stuart.)
Richards, who still practices ophthalmology in Manhattan, remembers feeling overwhelmed in the first set against Wade. "It was the emotion of the moment," she told me. "The whole thing was just such a dramatic, and traumatic, experience." But she pulled herself together in the second set against a superior player ("Virginia was always tough for me," she said). The women never discussed Wade's gibe, Richards said, and they went on to become good friends. In fact, Wade is now one of her patients.
