Tennis Legend Moody Dies In California At 92

Helen Wills Moody, the hard-hitting, poker-faced tennis star who won eight Wimbledon singles titles during the 1920s and ‘30s - a record that stood for 52 years, until Martina Navratilova - has died at 92.

Moody was a premier figure in America’s golden era of sports, sharing newspaper headlines with the likes of baseball’s Babe Ruth and football’s Red Grange.

She won 31 major titles, including seven U.S. Opens and four French Opens.

She hit the ball harder than anyone she faced, slamming both forehand and backhand shots the full length of the court. Her serious demeanor earned her the nickname “Little Miss Poker Face,” and her trademark white eyeshade became an enduring tennis accessory.

“She never showed any expression on the court. Nobody knew what she was thinking,” said Margaret Osborne duPont, a Wimbledon singles winner in 1947.

Moody won her first U.S. women’s tournament in 1923 and retired after winning at Wimbledon in 1938. She was 18-2 in singles matches at the Wightman Cup, a women’s team event between Britain and the U.S.

Moody, a surgeon’s daughter, learned the game without ever taking a lesson, picking it up from watching players at the Berkeley Tennis Club. One year after she started playing at age 14, she won the first of her two girls national titles. She was just 17 when she won the U.S. women’s singles championship - the youngest champion at the time.

She won an Olympic gold medal in Paris in 1924, was inducted into the Tennis Hall of Fame in 1959 and was The Associated Press Female Athlete of the Year in 1935.

Off the court, she was a recluse. Tennis great Alice Marble called her the “Greta Garbo of tennis.”

She had no survivors. Her ashes will be scattered at sea. No service will be held.