“I take a certain whimsical pride in not only having won the Grand Slam but, in a sense, having created it as well,” Don Budge wrote in his memoirs.
In 1938, the year Budge won the Australian, French, Wimbledon, and U.S. championships, there was initially no name to describe his feat. But five years earlier, when Australian player Jack Crawford came within one set of doing the same thing, a writer had observed that Crawford just missed achieving the tennis equivalent of a bridge “Grand Slam.” The term had also been used to describe golfer Bobby Jones' achievement in 1930, when he won what were then his sport's four major events in a single year. The expression was dusted off again in '38, and Budge’s accomplishment – winning all four tournaments in the same calendar year – was termed the Grand Slam.
Ever since, the Slam has been a holy grail for tennis’ greatest champions, and only a handful have achieved it. Rod Laver won the Grand Slam twice, in 1962 and 1969, and remains the only man other than Budge to have done so. Laver is also the only player, male or female, to win it twice. On the women’s side, there have been three Grand Slam champions: Maureen Connolly in 1953, Margaret Court in 1970, and Steffi Graf in 1988. (Graf also won the Olympic singles title in Seoul in 1988, so her feat was termed a Golden Slam.)
While it doesn’t carry the same cachet as a single-year sweep of the four majors, Martina Navratilova and Serena Williams managed non-calendar Slams in 1983-1984 and 2002-2003, respectively. Navratilova, in fact, won not just four but six consecutive Grand Slam events.
Notably, the Grand Slam was not even Budge's main priority when the 1938 season started. The 23-year-old’s top goal was to help the U.S. defend its Davis Cup title, and he saw the Grand Slam events merely as a means of staying sharp for the challenge final towards the end of the year.
Budge told only his friend and fellow player Gene Mako about his secondary goal – winning all four major championships. The two made the three-week trek Down Under and left the following month with the Australian title in Budge’s pocket.
Despite suffering from an upset stomach, the red-haired Oakland, Calif., native next won the French, and was treated to a concert in his honor, chez Pablo Casals, by the brilliant cellist afterwards. Budge was then well on his way to winning Wimbledon when, inexplicably, his famous backhand deserted him. As he explained in his memoir, watching a veteran ladies’ match on a side court helped him rediscover his stroke:
“Suddenly it was there. That old girl moved over and reached out and hit this gorgeous singing topspin backhand. I kept watching. She did it again, and the rest just fell into place for me. She was hitting a topspin backhand the way you are supposed to, stroking up; I had stopped hitting mine that way. I was trying to hit all my backhands with underspin. It was all, quickly, very, very plain before me. I saluted the lady, my benefactress, and dashed off to the clubhouse.”
His weapon restored, Budge not only won the Wimbledon singles but also the doubles (with Mako) and the mixed doubles with Alice Marble.
The U.S. then successfully defended its Davis Cup title, though Budge was again afflicted by physical woes – this time the flu. At the U.S. championships, the fourth and final hurdle on the path to the Grand Slam, Budge’s problem was toothache. An extraction fixed the problem, and a pain-free Budge was able to reach the final at Forest Hills – the same stage at which Crawford had fallen two years ago.
In a compelling twist, Budge’s opponent in that final was Gene Mako. The player who had accompanied Budge throughout his long journey now stood as the final foil to his quest. Later, Budge wrote that his four-set victory was all the more satisfying considering it came against a close friend who could appreciate the magnitude of the first Grand Slam in tennis history:
“When at last I hit the shot that won Forest Hills and the Grand Slam, when I rushed the net, the man who was there to shake my hand and congratulate me was the only other man in the world who knew what I had really accomplished and how much I cared.”
Don Budge’s “A Tennis Memoir” and Bud Collins’ “The Modern Encyclopedia of Tennis" were used as sources for this article.