‘If Queen will be at final, I’ll make sure I am too’
Tunbridge Wells Grammar School for Girls is currently rated Outstanding by Ofsted, and with its long history - it was founded in 1905 - it is perhaps not surprising that some of its pupils have gone on to achieve great fame and success.
Among them was one
Sarah Wade, better known as Virginia Wade, the tennis player, who was a pupil at the school with her sister for three years in the early 1960s.
Sarah Virginia Wade OBE was born on July 10, 1945, in Bournemouth. Her father, Canon Eustace Holland Wade, was a vicar and when she was just one year old, the family emigrated to South Africa, where he became the Archdeacon of St Peter’s Church in Durban.
When Wade was 15, the family returned to England, initially - and appropriately to Wimbledon, before settling in Tunbridge Wells.
Wade had taken up tennis at the age of nine and continued playing at Tunbridge Wells, helping her school win the LTA Aberdare Cup, while passing her A-levels that would take her to the University of Sussex to read mathematics and physics (she graduated in 1966).
Her first triumph as a professional in a major tournament came when she beat Billie Jean King in the 1968 US Open.
She went on to win three major tennis singles championships and four major doubles championships, and was once ranked No. 2 in the world in singles, and No. 1 in the world in doubles.
It took her 16 attempts, but Wade finally won Wimbledon in 1977, beating the defending champion Chris Evert in the semi-final, and beating Betty Stöve in the final - nine days before her 32nd birthday.
That year was a special one at Wimbledon; it was the All England Club’s centenary and also the Silver Jubilee year of The Queen (not a tennis fan), who had agreed to attend the final for only the second time. Wade is quoted as saying before the tournament: “If the Queen’s going to be at the final, I’m going to make sure I am there too.”
After Wade it would be another 36 years before a British player won a Wimbledon Championship again - Andy Murray in 2013. Wade retired from playing in 1986, by which time she had played at Wimbledon on 26 occasions, still an all-time record.
She stayed with the game, becoming a TV sports commentator.
Wade never married and has no children.
In 1965, her father purchased Sharsted Court, a medieval hall house at Doddington, and on his death, Wade inherited a part share in its ownership along with her siblings.
She still refers to it as “the family home” although her sister, Judith Shepley, lives there. Wade now divides her time between her home in New York, her apartment in Fulham, London, and her villa in Barbados.