In honour of Anthony Wilding, NZ Tennis Great

Back in 1906, Anthony Wilding from New Zealand was forging a name for himself with other Australian players not only at Wimbledon but also at the Davis Cup. At this time Australasia permitted players from NZ and Australia to compete together at the Davis Cup and at Wimbledon the dominance of Australian Norman Brookes and Anthony helped cement public interest in the development of tennis in the lands down under.

Norman (pictured right) won the singles in 1907 and 1914. Tony (left) won it four years straight from 1910 -1913 plus they won the doubles together in 1907 and 1914. In 1908 and 1910 when Norman didn’t play, Tony won the doubles with M Ritchie. In addition, Tony won the mixed doubles in 1906 and 1908.

Tragically, in World War 1, Tony was killed in action at Flanders. As with so many other sports, who knows what may have been had the war not taken so many talented young men.

In honour of Tony’s life and to celebrate his success at the elite levels of tennis one hundred years on, a relative, Anna Wilding has set up a charitable foundation.

The press release reads as provided:

Anna Wilding Launches Charity- the Wilding Foundation Melbourne May 2009 – A new charity has launched, the Wilding Foundation, that aims to fill an overlooked gap in the charity and non profit marketplace. www.wildingfoundation.com The founder, award winning actress director and producer Anna Wilding said it is “a diverse, exciting and contemporary charity that is also couched in history”

The Wilding Foundation awards scholarships to those of exceptional ability and prowess in sports, arts, humanities, health, medicine and environmental activities. The Foundation will support those who may not otherwise have the financial means and/or knowledge at hand to further their potential. The charities aims are diverse with the inclusion of several primary scholarship.
The first scholarship is in honor of one of the world’s greatest tennis players ,the Anthony Wilding Scholarship for prowess in sports. Anthony Wilding is a legendary tennis player who, amongst other things won Wimbledon a total of ten times prior to World War 1. He garnered the record for most Wimbledon singles titles in a row for over fifty years. This record was finally broken at Monte Carlo by Rafael Nadel in 2008. Rafael Nadel finally broke his long-standing record at Monte Carlo in 2008. Wilding’s doubles partner, in Davis Cup and Wimbledon was the great Aussie tennis player Norman Brookes. Wilding was the first man to take a motorcycle solo through Europe, his preferred method of travel between tournaments.
Anthony tragically died in Flanders in 1915 at the age of 32.
Along with the Anthony Wilding scholarship are awards in environmental, arts and humanitarian fields.The charity accepts contributions from donors worldwide. The Board of Directors hopes to see the charity grow steadily over the next few years.
The Wilding Foundation is a proponent of Web 2.0, the social media platform and is pleased to announce that even Twitter users can now donate through their Twitter accounts. The Twitter username for the charity is “wildingcharity”.

Anna Wilding, a supporter of humanitarian and environmental issues as well as a gifted filmmaker, has personally experienced what it is like to miss out – of not being able to pursue a chosen direction due to financial factors. Ms Wilding, tipped to go to Wimbledon and join the professional circuit herself as a youngster could not afford the required training overseas.She hopes that this charity will help bridge a gap for those impoverished who display talent and cannot afford the training, travel, study or equipment.

For inquires please contact :
Wilding Foundation [email protected] Tel: 61 424 716 440
Lionel Midford PR [email protected]

Tennis History is pleased to support this foundation in honour of a truly inspiring contributor to the development of tennis.

Cheers Rod

This entry was written by Rod and posted on May 31, 2009 at 1:26 pm and filed under Uncategorized. Bookmark the permalink. Follow any comments here with the RSS feed for this post.

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