Billie Jean King graduates from college at age 82 after leaving for tennis: Yeah baby, only 61 years!'

Billie Jean King left college in 1964 with a purpose and soon became the top-ranked tennis professional. She won 39 championships and received major national honors, including the Presidential Medal of Freedom and the Congressional Gold Medal. Throughout her career, she pushed publicly for gender and pay equality. She returned decades later to finish a history degree she began more than sixty years earlier and graduated at age 82. At her commencement, she described growing up in a working-class family and being the first in her immediate family to graduate college. She chose Cal State Los Angeles because her tennis coach trained men and women together, which she credited as revolutionary and beneficial for competition. She also recalled early experiences with discrimination at tennis clubs where most people were white.

"When Billie Jean King left college in 1964, she had a purpose. Within a few years, she had become the top-ranked tennis professional in the world. Over a trailblazing career, she won 39 championships, a Presidential Medal of Freedom and a Congressional Gold Medal all while pushing publicly for gender and pay equality. Last year, she finally returned to finish the degree in history she started more than six decades ago. On Monday, she graduated at 82 years old."

"It is a privilege for me to be here as a member of your graduating class, King said at her commencement. Yeah baby, only 61 years! King recalled growing up in a working-class family, the daughter of a firefighter father and homemaker mother. Like so many of my fellow graduates, I am the first member of my immediate family to graduate college, like many of you, King said."

"She chose Cal State Los Angeles, then known as Los Angeles State College, because the tennis coach, Scotty Deeds, trained men and women together. He said it would help give her the level of competition she needed to excel. Billie Jean King hits tennis balls to graduates after delivering remarks during commencement at California State University, Los Angeles. Their approach to winning in tennis was revolutionary at the time, King said of Deeds and the women's coach Dr Joan Johnson."

"King distinguished herself as a tennis champ in college, winning Wimbledon doubles while enrolled. King was 18 and her partner, Karen Hantze, was 17, making them the youngest team to win at the time. But King told the crowd that her true motivation since childhood had been to fight discrimination, a calling she first remembered feeling at age 12, when she realized that virtually everyone at the tennis clubs where she trained was white."

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