Dick Savitt, a self-taught tennis Hall of Famer who won the Australian and Wimbledon Grand Slam tournaments in 1951 but quit a year later to work in the oil industry and eventually on Wall Street, died Jan. 6 at his home in Manhattan. He was 95.
The burly, 6-foot-3 Mr. Savitt rose to stardom in January 1951 while making his debut at the Australian Championships in Sydney, where he outlasted defending champion Frank Sedgman in the semifinals and beat Ken McGregor to win the title. He was the first non-Australian in 13 years to win the tournament, now known as the Australian Open, and arrived at Wimbledon five months later as an extraordinarily confident No. 6 seed.
Mr. Savitt went on to lose in the semifinals of the U.S. National Championships , where he was seeded No. 1 but was hobbled by a leg infection. And while he helped the U.S. team advance in the Davis Cup, he was bitterly disappointed not to be selected for the final round against Australia. The Americans lost, 3-2, with the semiretired Ted Schroeder as his replacement.To some, Mr.
Mr. Savitt moved to Texas to work for an oil company and arrived in New York in the late 1950s, working as a stockbroker and investment adviser for firms including Lehman Brothers, Schroders and Morgan Stanley. He also continued to play in occasional tennis tournaments, in addition to mentoring younger players on the court. His proteges included students at Columbia University, which named its tennis center after him, as well as professionals such as Arthur Ashe and Vitas Gerulaitis.
After serving in the Navy at the close of World War II, he enrolled at Cornell in 1946 and suffered a knee injury that essentially ended his career on the hardwood. He went on to compile a collegiate tennis record of 57-2 before receiving a bachelor’s degree in economics in 1950. That same year, he reached the semifinals of the U.S. National Championships in New York, losing to eventual champion Art Larsen.
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