Anita Kanter (born 1933) is a former amateur tennis player from the U.S. who played in the 1950s. In singles, Kanter was ranked # 6 in the United States (and # 10 in the world by World Tennis magazine) in 1952, and # 9 in the US in 1953.[1][2][3]
| Born | 1933 (age 90–91) Santa Monica, California |
|---|---|
| College | University of California-Los Angeles |
| Medal record | ||
|---|---|---|
Representing  United States
| ||
| Maccabiah Games | ||
| Women's tennis | ||
 |
1953 Israel | Women's Singles |
 |
1953 Israel | Mixed Doubles |
|
1953 Israel | Women's Doubles |
Early life
editKanter was born in Santa Monica, California, and is Jewish.[4][5] She attended Santa Monica High School.[6]
Tennis career
editKanter won the 1949 US Girls National Hard Court Singles Championship.[3] She won the US girls tennis championship in 1951 as an 18-year-old sophomore at the University of California-Los Angeles, as well as the 1951 National Hard Court Doubles and Mixed Doubles championships.[7][3]
In 1952, she won the U.S. Women's Clay Court Championships, and was the runner-up at the Foothills Cup.[7][3] That year at the Cincinnati Masters, she won both the singles and doubles titles.[8]
In 1953 she won the US National hard court tennis championship,[5] successfully defended her doubles title,[3] and reached the singles final. She was seeded no. 1 in singles and doubles in both appearances in Cincinnati. In doubles in those two years, she paired with Joan Merciadis in 1952 and with Thelma Long of Australia in 1953.[9]
Maccabiah Games
editKanter, who is Jewish, competed in Israel in the 1953 Maccabiah Games—the "Jewish Olympics".[10] At the Games, Kanter, ranked #9 in the US at the time, lost the women's singles title to Angela Buxton and ended up with the silver medal,[11][12][13] but won two gold medals, one as she won the mixed doubles title with Grant Golden and one as she won the women's double title with Toby Greenberg - beating Angela Buxton and Carol Levy of Britain in the final.[7][14][3]
Hall of Fame
editIn 2014, she was inducted into the Southern California Jewish Sports Hall of Fame.[15][3]
See also
editReferences
edit- ^ Bernard Postal, Jesse Silver, Roy Silver (1965). Encyclopedia of Jews in Sports
- ^ Martin Harry Greenberg (1979). The Jewish lists: physicists and generals, actors and writers, and hundreds of other lists of accomplished Jews
- ^ a b c d e f g "ANITA KANTER-KAPPEl; Tennis - 2014". Southern California Jewish Sports Hall of Fame. Archived from the original on June 18, 2016. Retrieved August 4, 2020.
- ^ Ron Kaplan (2015). The Jewish Olympics: The History of the Maccabiah Games
- ^ a b Bob Wechsler (2008). Day by Day in Jewish sports history. KTAV Publishing House. ISBN 9781602800137. Retrieved March 20, 2011.
- ^ "UCLA Daily Bruin". Los Angeles. August 4, 1912 – via Internet Archive.
- ^ a b c Kanter, Anita: Jews In Sports
- ^ "Tennis - WTA Tour - Cincinnati : Medal winners and event presentation". www.the-sports.org.
- ^ Best Sports Stories, 1954.
- ^ "Anita Kantor Wins in Tel Aviv Games". Retrieved March 20, 2011.
- ^ Bruce Schoenfeld (2004). The match: Althea Gibson and Angela Buxton: how two outsiders--one Black, the other Jewish--forged a friendship and made sports history. HarperCollins. ISBN 9780060526528. Retrieved March 20, 2011.
- ^ Robert Slater (2000). Great Jews in Sports. J. David Publishers. ISBN 9780824604332. Retrieved March 20, 2011.
- ^ Jack Leon (June 28, 1957). "ISRAEL'S LEADING NETTER Arieh Avidan Will Be at Forest Hills". Jewish Post.
- ^ "The Wisconsin Jewish Chronicle from Milwaukee, Wisconsin on October 2, 1953 · Page 3". Newspapers.com. October 2, 1953.
- ^ Eric Sondheimer (September 16, 2013). "15 selected for Southern California Jewish Sports Hall of Fame," Los Angeles Times.