THE
P RTAL
November 2017
Page 7
Patti Fordyce
Jackie Ottaway and Ronald Crane have been to visit Patti Fordyce
W e settled
in Patti Fordyce’s comfortable flat in West London. It has a spectacular view of
the river Thames, which together with the refreshments she provided for us, made a very pleasant
afternoon’s work.
Many of you will know Patti from
her involvement with LOGS, the
Ladies’ Ordinariate Group. You may
have seen her at the Ordinariate
Festival in Westminster Cathedral
Hall helping with the refreshments.
She makes wonderful sandwiches.
he was knocked off his motorbike
when she was about four. He had a
badly broken leg which didn’t get set
properly and he wasn’t fit for duty
anymore. He was offered a desk job
and he decided he didn’t fancy that,
so he sold insurance for a while and
then trained as a teacher.
What many of you may not know
is that Patti is an American former
At 17 Patti came to England to
international tennis player. She
play tennis. Tennis was not just a
competed in the Wightman and
job, she enjoyed it. She loved what
Federation Cups, representing the
you can do with a ball and a racket.
U.S.A. a number of times, from 1970
She added, “I’m quite competitive
to 1973. Together with compatriot
too.
Peggy Michel, she reached the
final of the doubles event at the 1969 Wimbledon
“I started tennis when I was eight. My dad found an
Championships.
old racket at the back of the cupboard and suggested I
might like to play tennis because there was no future
In 1967 she won the All England Plate, a competition for a girl in baseball. That would have been my first
for players who were defeated in the first or second choice.
rounds of the Wimbledon singles competition. In July
1973 she won the singles title at the North of England
“He had this broken leg so he would sit on a chair
Championships in Hoylake after defeating compatriot in our garage and throw balls to me in the driveway.
Sharon Walsh in the final in three sets.
I would hit them back into the garage so we didn’t
have to walk very far to pick them up. After a while
Patti was born in San Diego, California and was there I got good at using him as target practice, so then he
until she was about 20. “I always tell people I came to thought it was time for me to graduate to a court.
England for the first time for six weeks, the second
time for three months and the third time I just stayed!”
“He would stand in the middle of a court with a
basket of balls and hit them to me and I would hit them
She discovered how serious a Catholic her father around the court. After nine months it was decided if
was when he was taken ill and she was going through I was enjoying it that much I should have some lessons
his wartime trunk. Her mother would have described so I could play properly. They took me to this guy who
herself as a Christian, but wouldn’t have claimed any had one leg, who taught at the local park and turned
denomination.
out to be Maureen Connolly’s first coach. (She won
Wimbledon 1951-1953.)
“My childhood was quite messy from a religion
point of view. I remember walking back from church
“He was amazing. He could do anything with a ball if
when I must have been about three, and I remember he could get near it. What he couldn’t do with a serve
my mother saying to my father, “Well, that’s it; if you just wasn’t worth doing. He was an incredible coach.
want this child to go to Mass you take her because l He said to me, ‘You see that wall over there. When you
will not”. That was pretty much it; my dad took me to can hit that wall 500 times without missing you can
Mass, sort of on and off.
call yourself a tennis player.’ I never managed it.”
An only child, Patti’s father was a policeman until
She met her husband, Ian, at the end of 1974. She