Arthur Ashe

by Raymond Arsenault

  At first, Arthur thought she was being too cautious, but at five the next morning he bolted up sweating profusely with a high fever. Later in the morning, he called Dr. Murray, who advised him to see a doctor in Miami before flying home. After a dose of Tylenol brought his fever down, he and Jeanne decided to take the first available flight to New York. Several hours later, he underwent an examination at New York Hospital, where Murray made a tentative diagnosis that he was suffering from an unusual form of pneumonia. Prescribing the antibiotic azithromycin, he allowed Arthur to go home for the weekend. But over the next two days the powerful drug had little effect, as his fever spiked and his coughing grew worse.

  On Monday, he returned to the hospital to see Dr. Thomas King, a pulmonary specialist, who immediately ordered a bronchoscopy. This unpleasant diagnostic procedure involved pushing a thick tube with a small video camera into the lungs through a nostril. After a half hour of monitoring the camera, Dr. King concluded his diagnosis. Arthur had all the signs of suffering from Pneumocystis carinii pneumonia, or PCP. The presence of PCP, a deadly disease rarely seen in patients without AIDS, was a clear indication Arthur’s luck had run out. “Thus far,” he explained in Days of Grace, “aside from the toxoplasmosis that uncovered the fact that I have AIDS, I had avoided every one of the opportunistic diseases that, in combination with the presence of HIV in the body, define the condition known as AIDS. Now I had one of the most feared.”43

  While the general prognosis was bleak, Dr. Murray reassured Arthur he would survive the current bout of PCP. The fever, chills, shivering, and coughing would continue for a time until his condition could be stabilized with a combination of Tylenol and pentamidine. While not in immediate danger of dying, he would have to remain in the hospital. A few days later, he moved to a long-term private room on the sixteenth floor. Named for the Greek shipping tycoon Stavros Niarchos, the luxurious room had once housed John F. Kennedy, a fact Arthur loved to recite when visitors came to call.

  Other than Jeanne’s multiple visits each day, there were a limited number of visits to his room. He welcomed members of his extended family, as well as several friends, notably Donald Dell, Frank Deford, Eddie Mandeville, and Andrew Young. Camera also visited him, but only twice. Arthur’s stated rationale for keeping her away was the desire to sustain her normal daily schedule. But one suspects he also worried about the emotional impact of repeated visits. As much as he wanted to spend time with her, he did not want her to remember him as an invalid.

  A few friends such as Stan Smith, Chris Beck, and Randall Robinson received calls from his hospital room phone, but at Jeanne’s suggestion, he left his cell phone at home, thus limiting the drain on his energy. While the calls he did make were mostly personal in nature, he also used them to maintain some connection with his public life. During the call to Robinson, for example, he lobbied for more activism on behalf of Haitian refugees. It was imperative, he told his old friend, “to press the initiative we had won with President Clinton’s election,” and for “the African American community . . . to extend its arms in welcome to the refugees.” Robinson, who agreed with everything Arthur said, could only marvel at his friend’s tenacity—fighting the good fight even as his life slipped away.

  Arthur and Jeanne were able to keep his grave condition “out of the news,” thanks to the discretion of the journalists and friends who knew but did not disclose what was transpiring at New York Hospital. All through January and early February, he continued to receive invitations to various public events, including Clinton’s inauguration on January 20. But he begged off as graciously as he could without any reference to his hospitalization. Most of his waking hours were spent reading or listening to music, and each day he devoted as much time to the Days of Grace manuscript as his energy level would tolerate. Back in December, he had told Kenny Moore of Sports Illustrated that he believed in living a full life, that the best course was to “pound away as hard as you can at what you care about until it’s over.” And that is what he did within the limits his failing body imposed.44

  In mid-January, he felt a bit stronger, and his doctors gave him the good news that he was well enough to be released from the hospital. Returning home where he could have the semblance of a normal family life boosted his spirits. For the time being, at least, his cough had subsided and his breathing was less labored. He even began to think ahead, anticipating things he wanted to do and projects he wanted to complete. One event he looked forward to was a father-daughter Valentine’s “red dress” dance at the Sleepy Hollow Country Club scheduled for Saturday, February 13. While he had no way of knowing how long he would live, the recent lull in his struggle with PCP suggested he would almost certainly survive long enough to experience the joy of accompanying Camera to the dance.45

  A second project that drew his interest in January was a proposed Arthur Ashe statue to be placed in front of the proposed African American Sports Hall of Fame. At this point there was no guarantee that the Hall of Fame would be built in the forseeable future, and Arthur doubted he would live long enough to witness its completion. But the idea of erecting a statue of his likeness appealed to him, especially if he could have an influence on its design. In a limited but significant way, he reasoned, the statue might enhance a positive legacy in his hometown. The imagery had to be just right, however—a representation of his ideals, something that would communicate his faith in education, equality, and active citizenship.

  The proposal to erect an Ashe statue originated with Paul DiPasquale, a Richmond sculptor known for his marble and stone representations of Native American figures. A chance meeting with Ashe during a tennis workshop in April 1992 led DiPasquale to discuss the statue idea with Clarence Townes, a Richmond economic development official spearheading the city’s effort to find a site and funding for the Hall of Fame. One of DiPasquale’s Native American sculptures had already been installed near the city’s new minor league baseball stadium adjacent to the Arthur Ashe Center, and a second piece of public art—a large bronze statue of “The Headman,” a figure commemorating the African American role in constructing the city’s canal system—was nearing completion. Through Townes, the sculptor provided city officials with a letter urging the addition of an Ashe statue to the Hall of Fame plan.

  After Ashe saw the letter, he called DiPasquale on January 21 to express his approval and to discuss the specifics of the statue’s design. Earlier in the month, the sculptor had sent Ashe a package that included a letter and photographs showing examples of his work. “I had asked him in my letter what he wanted to portray, what sort of message did he want to send,” DiPasquale recalled. “He had this shopping list of ideas. He wanted children, he wanted himself but not to be the center of attention; he wanted to share the podium with the children. He wanted books . . . ‘to portray that knowledge is power.’ And he wanted to be in his warm-up suit, in his tennis shoes, and he said ‘I want to be as I am today.’ . . . And as a closing, almost an aside, he said ‘Oh, and I suppose a tennis racquet should be in there somewhere.’ ”

  After assuring Ashe he would abide by his wishes, DiPasquale requested a few items to help him produce an accurate representation of reality: “I asked him to send me photos, not posed, but informal, candid shots. Pictures of how he held himself, walked, stood.” Knowing Ashe’s reputation for efficient attention to detail, the sculptor expected to receive the photos within a week. But two weeks later he was still waiting for them to arrive at his Richmond studio.

  Scheduled to visit New York in mid-February, he called Arthur on Friday the 5th to see if they could meet in person, but no one answered the phone. On Saturday, he called a second time, but once again there was no response. Only when he read the Sunday morning headlines did he understand why Arthur had not answered. Readmitted to the hospital on Friday morning, Arthur was put on a mechanical ventilator that kept him alive but also made it impossible for him to speak. As resourceful as ever, he found another way to communicate by writing notes on a tiny pad of
paper. Most were to Jeanne, but a few were more public in nature, including a message to President Clinton urging the appointment of a civil rights–minded attorney general. Watching her dying husband as he struggled to scratch out a few meaningful words, Jeanne could only nod her head in love and admiration. His condition had improved slightly during the morning, and he refused to give up. Only on Saturday, February 6, his second day in the hospital, did he begin to slip in and out of consciousness. At 3:13 that afternoon he took his last breath.

  When the package of photos finally arrived in Richmond the following Wednesday, the day of Arthur’s funeral, DiPasquale wept uncontrollably for the man who had not forgotten him after all. Two weeks later, when the sculptor contacted Jeanne to see if she wanted to proceed with the statue project, she revealed that getting the photos ready to mail “was the last thing he did before going to the hospital.” Even at the end of Arthur’s life, when the mere act of breathing was a major struggle, he somehow managed to follow through with his promise. A man determined to fulfill pledges large and small, a man of uncommon integrity and responsibility—that is who he was, and it was this nobility of spirit that DiPasquale’s sculpture would try to capture.46

  EPILOGUE

  SHADOW’S END

  PAUL DIPASQUALE WAS NOT the only one caught short by Arthur Ashe’s unexpected death. As Arthur’s medical situation worsened during the first week of February, only a few hospital workers, close friends, and family members knew what was happening. For everyone else his passing came as a shock. Even though his AIDS diagnosis was widely recognized as a death sentence, his ability to maintain a strenuous schedule of public activities during the past ten months had given the false impression that he was in no immediate danger. Since his disclosure in April 1992, he had grown noticeably thin, but otherwise he appeared to be relatively healthy.

  Those following his case closely knew he had been HIV-positive for nearly a decade, and that he had suffered from full-blown AIDS for at least half of that time. But neither the public nor the medical establishment had a clear idea of how long an AIDS patient was likely to live. Much of the nation—including a large number of politicians and physicians—was still in a state of ignorance when it came to AIDS, even though AIDS-related deaths had been a daily occurrence since the early 1980s. With the development of reliable blood testing in 1985, AIDS deaths stemming from blood transfusions declined precipitously, leaving gay men and intravenous drug users as the most identifiable victims of the disease. Unlike the other celebrities who died of AIDS during the first decade of the pandemic—notably the actor Rock Hudson, the dancer Rudolf Nureyev, the pianist Liberace, and the artist Robert Mapplethorpe—Ashe, as a drug-free heterosexual, seemed anomalous.1

  On Sunday, February 7, the day after Arthur’s death, Jeanne issued a press release that emphasized the special quality of his life, making only brief mention of the cause and manner of his death. “Arthur was the ultimate competitor in tennis and in life,” she proclaimed. “He fought hard on the last days of his life and even though he lost his battle, as in his tennis days, it was always how he played the game. He will be greatly missed by Camera and me and our entire family.” The release also contained a moving tribute from Donald Dell. “Arthur was so special because of his quiet courage and selflessness, which made a lasting impact on those he touched,” declared his friend of thirty years. “Arthur set an example and standard of personal conduct for all of us who loved him to try and emulate in our lives. The world will never experience another sportsman like Arthur Ashe.” In closing, the family requested that individuals interested in paying respect to the deceased should make contributions to the Arthur Ashe Foundation for the Defeat of AIDS in lieu of sending flowers.2

  When the press reports of Arthur’s death ran that morning—most appearing on the front pages of newspapers all over the United States and beyond—the coverage was both massive and reverential, an outpouring more befitting a head of state than a mere sports hero. The New York Times led the way with two stories on Sunday and five more the next day. The lead piece in the Times, titled “Ashe, a Champion in Sport and Life,” reported that when the news of his death reached Madison Square Garden on Saturday night, just before the start of a heavyweight fight between Riddick Bowe and Michael Dokes, the stunned crowd stood in silence as a bell rang ten times in Arthur’s honor. Three thousand miles to the west, at a tennis tournament in San Francisco, another crowd stood for an extended moment of silence. “I have always admired his courage, respected his integrity and have been impressed by all he has done for so many,” tournament director Barry MacKay declared, fighting back tears. “Arthur’s passing represents a tremendous loss for tennis and the world beyond.”3

  Bill Rhoden, a prominent African American sportswriter for the Times, offered a tribute titled “Arthur Ashe: A Hero in Word and Deed.” The two men had scheduled a lunch for the following week, Rhoden reported, but now he would have to go on without the benefit of a final meeting. “He has left a tremendous void,” Rhoden wrote, “but also has issued a tremendous challenge to those who feel—like he felt—that sports is merely a point of departure, that sports can be more, must be more than what it is. That is Arthur Ashe’s legacy. And I’ll think of that every time I remember that lunch date we will never keep.”4

  Another friend who missed the chance to say goodbye was David Dinkins, who was on vacation in Puerto Rico. “Words cannot suffice to capture a career as glorious, a life so fully lived or a commitment to justice as firm and as fair as his,” Dinkins told the Times by phone. “From his very early youth, Arthur Ashe has always kept his eye on the ball, not just on the tennis court, but in every single aspect of his life. He celebrated the many championships he won, the many records he set. But day in and day out, always he wondered about and worried for those less fortunate than he.” Governor Douglas Wilder, who had known Arthur even longer than Mayor Dinkins, voiced a similar tribute: “Not only have I lost a dear friend, but America has lost a moral giant. His leadership . . . was totally committed to improving the lives of those yet to enjoy the full fruition of rights and opportunities in this country.”

  Governor Wilder made sure Richmond and the rest of Virginia paid due respect to its fallen favorite son. Following an autopsy on Monday, Arthur’s body was transported to Richmond to lie in state at the Virginia Executive Mansion, the stately yellow brick home with massive columns that stands behind the commonwealth’s capitol. If anyone objected to this special public tribute, no one said so out loud. But nearly everyone was aware he or she was witnessing a scene unimaginable in an earlier, less tolerant era. The last Virginian to be so honored was General Stonewall Jackson in 1863. Yet here was a governor and a local hero—both black and both born and raised under the shadow of Jim Crow—sharing a sacred space in a house built by slaves in 1813, a house symbolizing the political and racial heritage of the Old South.

  On that Tuesday evening the line of mourners stretched along five blocks, and some waited as long as four hours for their turn to pass by the open mahogany casket resting on a burgundy-draped bier. Out on the lawn the governor held an impromptu news conference, assuring reporters the massive turnout marked the beginning of an enviable and unprecedented legacy. With Camera by her side, Jeanne roamed the grounds and the first floor of the mansion, sometimes snapping photos of the crowd but mostly visiting with friends and family members. By nine o’clock, when the capitol police closed the door leading to the viewing room, more than five thousand people had walked by the casket to say goodbye, many pausing for “a few reflective moments,” as Ira Berkow of The New York Times observed. Moved by the seemingly endless line of mourners, black and white, Berkow noted the irony that it had taken Arthur “49 years to travel the two miles from where he grew up on Sledd Street here to the Governor of Virginia’s Executive Mansion.”5

  The next morning the memorialization moved to more familiar ground—to the Arthur Ashe Center, North Richmond’s cavernous gymnasium. The memorial service was sch
eduled to begin at one o’clock, but some members of the crowd were already lined up in front of the entrance at 7 a.m. By the time the service began with a ten-minute-long version of “When the Saints Go Marching In”—a choral tribute accompanying a lengthy procession of Arthur’s relatives—there were more than six thousand people in the seats. According to one estimate, more than 90 percent of the crowd was African American, but the nearly six hundred whites in attendance were noteworthy, representing the largest white turnout at a predominantly black gathering in Virginia history.

  For the most part, the pageantry and spirit of the service transcended race as tearful mourners—black and white—looked down on the open casket “topped with two cotton doves and 275 red roses.” The Reverend Wallace Cook of Ebenezer Baptist Church set the tone by proclaiming, “We’ve gathered to celebrate the life of a great humanitarian who has come home.” Readings from the works of Howard Thurman and several gospel selections followed, punctuating a sequence of more than a dozen speakers who eulogized the departed as a hero among heroes. Jesse Jackson reminded the crowd that Arthur was a profoundly influential force, a man who “knocked down walls and built bridges.” “Most athletes limit themselves to achievements and contributions within the lines,” he declared, “but Arthur found greatness beyond the lines,” as “he turned anger into energy and stumbling blocks into steppingstones.” David Dinkins, after insisting “Arthur Ashe was just plain better than most of us,” declared: “If ever there was a man who proved civility is not a weakness, it was Arthur.” Wiping tears from his eyes, he acknowledged: “Words cannot suffice to capture a career as glorious, a life so fully lived, or a commitment to justice as firm and fair as his.” In equally emotional terms, Governor Wilder foresaw a powerful legacy, noting “loving kindness survives even death.”