The tennis community — on Hilton Head Island and around the world — is mourning the loss of a legend.
Dennis Van der Meer, the revolutionary coach and “teacher of teachers” who established a world-class tennis academy on Hilton Head Island and helped make it a tennis Mecca, died Saturday. He was 86.
A flood of social media posts began to spread Saturday evening as the news made its way through the tight-knit tennis community. Many tributes came from tennis players who had learned — either to play or to coach — at Van der Meer’s side, and most of them included condolences for Van der Meer’s wife, Pat, who was his close partner in building a tennis powerhouse.
“Today the tennis world lost one of its most influential leaders. Dennis Van Der Meer has passed away,” fellow renowned instructor Tom Sweitzer wrote on Facebook. “He was a true gentleman and the world’s greatest tennis ambassador. His reach across the net and around the world will never be matched.”
Born in Namibia in 1933, Van der Meer emigrated to California in 1961 and became a naturalized U.S. citizen in 1972. He moved to Hilton Head Island in 1973.
Van der Meer was world-renowned not only as a legendary coach — he coached Billy Jean King to her historic win in the “Battle of the Sexes” match against Bobby Riggs — but also as an innovator.
In addition to Van Der Meer Tennis Academy, where young players are trained for future collegiate or professional careers, the Van der Meers also established the Professional Tennis Registry (PTR) and Tennis University, to teach the teachers. PTR boasts more than 16,500 members in 125 countries and helps educate instructors about better teaching and coaching methods and provides certification programs.
Van der Meer is also credited with helping spur growth in wheelchair tennis, both through PTR programming helping instructors learn how to teach wheelchair tennis and through hosting the annual PTR Wheelchair Tennis Championships.
PTR’s Facebook post confirming the sad news put it simply, but perfectly: “His outstanding and remarkable contribution to tennis will live on forever.”