TO SERVE WITH LOVE, from serving at Wimbledon to serving the community, a memoir

161pp., b/w & colour illus., paperback, Johannesburg, 2022

Marlene Bethlehem (née Gerson) grew up in Johannesburg in the 1940s and 1950s. She won the ladies’ singles All England plate at Wimbledon in 1962, worked as a professional tennis coach (1964-1985) and was the official coach to the first-ever black South African women’s tennis team (1974). She went on to serve the Jewish community in various roles: She was elected as Chair of the Jewish Board of Deputies in 1995 and later as Vice-Chair of South Africa's Commission for the Protection of the Rights of Religious and Cultural Communities and as President of The New York-based Memorial Foundation for Jewish Culture.