Pivotal moments in civil rights struggles sometimes go unremarked until long after the fact — think Stonewall. Sometimes, these moments upend stone walls, with the cracking apart thunderingly audible, visceral, and instantaneous. The much-vaunted “Battle of the Sexes,” the Billie Jean King vs. Bobby Riggs tennis match on September 20, 1973, was one such moment.
How to explain just how gleefully the braying and spittle-spraying sexism that gushed from the determinedly anti-women’s tennis edifice was accepted? Polite talking heads decried the “masculine way” King played tennis in “ugly” togs.
Sports commentators blithely remarked that her husband had “become accustomed to walking a few steps behind his wife. Larry’s had enough of tennis, but as yet he’s not put his foot down about his wife’s future.”
But it was Riggs who lobbed the stink bombs and the IEDs. A former Wimbledon champ, he was by this time an over-the-hill hustler, making a living on gimmick matches: playing in drag or among a series of chairs peppering his side of the net. He longed for the spotlight, so why not shout that no woman could defeat a man? Show those Women’s Libbers!
Meanwhile, King had been methodically smashing records for years. And there was Title IX, met with stentorian denunciations by the male sports establishment.
“In 1972, Title IX of the Education Act established basic and revolutionary guidelines to provide adequate funding and facilities for women’s sports in federally aided schools,” Lois Decker O’Neil wrote in “The Women’s Book of World Records and Achievements.” “[Title IX means] women athletes [can] continue their competitive lives with the aid of scholarship, coaching and facilities … on a level comparable to world competitions.”
King had spent three years (‘71 to ‘73) forming the Women’s Tennis Association, stumping for equality in matches and pay. She also spent much time winning, and in 1972, she was the first woman to be chosen as Sports Illustrated’s “Sportsperson of the Year” and in 1973, the Associated Press’ “Female Athlete of the Year.”
“Alongside the fight against pay disparity, King was combating stereotypes that female tennis players were not as skilled,” Anna Diamond wrote in the Smithsonian. “An idea trumpeted by the gleefully chauvinistic Riggs.”
He wanted King, who kept saying no. So, he courted Margaret Court, the number one ranked woman tennis player in 1973, and an old-school “graceful and ladylike” player. He defeated her in an hour. It was the “Mother’s Day Massacre” of May 1973.
“Now I want King bad,” Riggs said. “I’m a woman specialist now.” King knew this was it, so she demanded a winner-take-all $100,000 prize ($686,000 today) — plus, ABC-TV would beam the match worldwide to an estimated 90 million viewers — more than any sporting event then or since. King knew TV could expose and explode the “macho man” bullshit. But if she lost, “I thought it would set us back 50 years if I didn’t win that match. It would ruin the women’s tour and affect all women’s self-esteem.”
The match was held in the Houston Astrodome, filled with 30,000 fans, and the sides clearly demarcated. Riggs was a Kublai Khan, hauled into the stadium over a gold carpet in a rickshaw pulled by eight well-endowed women in red shorts.
King was borne in a golden litter, the interior pink satin with white and pink plumes. Cleopatra-like, four muscular, bare-chested men wearing stylized slave outfits conveyed her, with others carrying plumes on long sticks.
Riggs presented King with a huge lollipop: “a sucker.” She gifted him a squealing little piglet, named “Male Chauvinist.”
She had to annihilate him. And she did, in three straight sets.
“This was why the Riggs match mattered so much: It wasn’t just about one loud-mouthed hustler,” June Thomas wrote in Slate. “It offered King a rare chance to volley back at chauvinism.”
Despite all his bets on himself — even Jimmy the Greek gave odds of 5 to 2 for Riggs — and with all the other anti-“women’s libbers” globally riding on his performance, Riggs blew out early and did not catch up.
The first thing he said to King afterward was, “I underestimated you.” And he had. The ladies in my all-women dorm, many of us completely disinterested in sports, watched. And when it was over, there was much shrieking, hugging, jumping about, and various, er, refreshments. And we were not the only ones. A seeming majority in the Astrodome, and many of those 90 million watching at home, joined in.