At the 1927 French Championships, Kea Bouman became the first tennis player from the Netherlands to win a Grand Slam title, and she is still the only Dutch woman to have done so.
With Lili Álvarez, she also won the French ladies’ doubles in 1929. She was ranked in the world Top 10 in 1927 and 1928. The greatest player of her era, Bill Tilden, noted that she was, “very strong with a good serve, hard forehand, and excellent footwork.”
Bouman also excelled in other sports. She won a Dutch title in golf, and played on the Dutch women’s hockey team. In 1931, she married Swiss rower Alex Tiedemann, and quit playing tennis. They emigrated to the Dutch East Indies and later lived in the United States. She died in 1998, days after the death of Henk Timmer, with whom she had partnered to a bronze medal in the 1924 Olympics. The two had trained together often, and had remained friends their entire lives.
Netherlands