Riggs, 55, a Wimbledon champion in 1939 and a self-described male chauvinist, had beaten Margaret Court that May and challenged King, 29, the top women's player. The match was staged with circus showmanship: King arrived on a litter carried by muscular men, and Riggs in a rickshaw pulled by models. King won in straight sets and collected the $100,000 prize. The victory came a year after Title IX and became a symbol of the women's movement.
King had been campaigning for equal prize money and had helped found the Women's Tennis Association that summer. She initially turned down Riggs's challenge. When Margaret Court, the world's top-ranked woman, played him instead on Mother's Day 1973 and lost badly, King felt she had to accept.
The match was held on a Thursday night in September before more than 30,000 spectators, then a record crowd for tennis. Riggs gave King a giant lollipop; she gave him a piglet. ABC broadcast it in prime time with Howard Cosell commentating. King's strategy was to keep Riggs running from side to side, and after losing an early break she took control. By the third set he was visibly tired.
King later said she felt she would set women back 50 years if she lost. For years there were rumours that Riggs had deliberately lost to pay off gambling debts, claims both players denied and that have never been proven. The two became friends; King called Riggs the night before he died in 1995.
Key people: Billie Jean King, Bobby Riggs, Howard Cosell