Tennis / Golf
'Rosebud' returns: Past champs reunite for 35th Family Circle Cup
By Mary Durben
Apr 11, 2008 - 8:08:53 AM

Rosie Casals was the winner of the first Family Circle Cup 35 years ago.

Rosemary, a.k.a. "Rosebud," "Rosie" Casals still counts among the highlights of her career that first Family Circle Cup championship back in 1973.

It was a brand new competition, mounted by Jack Jones and John Moreno and sponsored by Family Circle magazine, whose owners decided to make a bold statement of commitment to women’s issues by becoming the first women’s magazine to fully underwrite a professional women’s tournament. It would be the first to offer $100,000 in total prizes and the first to be broadcast on a national television network, NBC. The winner would take home a check for $30,000, the largest prize ever awarded to a woman at that time.

Casals beat her longtime doubles partner, Billie Jean King, and then clay court specialist Nancy Richey to claim the title.

"It was very exhilarating," she said in a recent interview. "It’s always great to be the first one. I know Chris (Evert) has won a few, and others . . .but I was the first, and no one can take that away from me."

Subsequent winners Chris Evert (1974-78, 1981, 1985), Martina Navratilova (1982-83, 1988, 1990), Conchita Martinez (1994-95), Arantxa Sanchez-Vicario (1996), Mary Pierce (2000) and Iva Majoli (2002) will return to celebrate the 35th anniversary of the tournament. Three other past winners, Justine Henin (2003, 2005), Venus Williams (2004), and last year’s winner, Jelena Jankovic will be contenders for the 2008 championship. Total prize money has climbed to $1.34 million.

"I’m glad they’re having the reunion," Casals said, because it will give younger players an appreciation of the history of the tournament. "It’s the longest-running tournament and sponsorship, and that doesn’t happen anymore."

Casals’ personal story and personality explain her involvement in changing women’s tennis. Casals was born in 1948 in San Francisco, a child of Salvadoran immigrants and a distant relative of cellist Pablo Casals. Less than a year after her birth, her parents decided they were too poor to raise Rosie and her older sister, Victoria, so they turned the girls over to a great-aunt and uncle, Manuel and Maria Casals. Manuel took them to the public tennis courts and taught them to play the game, and was the only coach Rosie ever had.

Rebellious from the start and determined to improve her game, Casals rejected rules that juniors could play only with children their own age. She entered tournaments where she could play with girls a few years older. By age 16 she was the top junior and women’s level player in northern California. At 17, she ranked 11th in the country and was wowing crowds with her aggressive playing style.

In 1966, Casals and doubles partner Billie Jean King won the U.S. hardcourt and indoor tournament for women and reached the quarterfinals at Wimbledon. The next year they took top prizes at Wimbledon and the United States and South African championships.

Tennis had been a sport of the leisure class, with major championships (including Wimbledon) reserved for amateurs, not those who had to accept pay to play. Casals worked for an arrangement that would allow amateurs and professionals to play in the same tournaments -- the "Open" concept.

Necessity fostered invention in Casals’ serve-and-volley game. She wowed fans with breathtaking leaps in matches with the likes of Margaret "The Arm" Court (who stood 5’11"), and wasn’t averse to slapping a ball between her legs.

A rebel against the traditional white tennis costume, she preferred spangled and sequined multi-colored outfits provided by designer Ted Tinling. She raised a stir at Wimbledon in 1972 when a purple-squiggled dress was deemed unacceptable and she was ordered off the court to change. The dress was later displayed in the Hall of Fame in Newport -- the dress got to the hall before she did.

She and Billie Jean King also fought for equal prizes for women, who traditionally received less than men. In 1970, they and seven other women, ("the nine") risked suspension and threatened to boycott tournaments if womens’ prize money were not increased. The USLTA (US Lawn Tennis Association) ruled against them, so they started their own tournament, the Virginia Slims Invitational. It was successful and other tournaments soon followed.

One of the shortest players in top-level women’s tennis history at a mere 5-feet 2 ¼-inches, Casals was, nevertheless, a giant of the game, taking the first-ever Virginia Slims championship in Houston in 1970 and helping to found the Women’s Tennis Association in 1973. That year she also provided color-commentary for the famous "Battle of the Sexes," Billie Jean King vs. Bobbie Riggs.

Casals said the other highlights of her career were her seven doubles wins at Wimbledon -- five with King, two with Martina Navratilova, the first Virginia Slims championship and being named to the Hall of Fame, which means "being acknowledged by your peers."

She remained in the USTA Top 5 for 11 years, achieving her highest ranking, No. 3, in 1975.

She won 11 singles titles and 112 doubles titles – the latter record second only to Martina Navratilova’s 162. She won five Wimbledon and two US women’s doubles titles with frequent partner Billie Jean King, and two mixed-doubles championships with Ilie Nastase. She won her last doubles championship as a 41-year-old alongside Navratilova in 1988 and a senior doubles championship in 1990 with King.

Casals, 58, now lives in Sausalito, Cal., where she runs Sportswoman Inc., which she founded in 1982.