This Week In National Press Club History

May 9, 2012: Tennis legend Billy Jean King, winner of twelve grand slam singles titles and sixteen grand slam doubles titles, and victor over Bobby Riggs in the famous 1973 “Battle of the Sexes,” tells a Club luncheon that children should play more tennis in the fight against obesity. She ends her talk by lobbing tennis balls into the audience. Arthur Ashe, who helped break the color barrier in U. S. professional tennis, appears twice at the Club, fist as a civil rights activist in 1974 and last in 1992, when he focuses on media invasions of personal privacy. Venus Williams, tennis phenomenon, sells out a Club luncheon a few days before her 2010 Wimbledon competition, and Chris Evert joins the list of tennis greats to appear at the Club, this week on May 7.

May 11, 1921: President Herbert Hoover becomes a member and active supporter of the National Press Club, and his last visit to the Club on March 10, 1954, draws a huge crowd.