Ladies' Day at Wimbledon

France's towering (6 ft. 7 in.) Yvon Petra stomped onto Wimbledon's famed center court wearing a white jockey cap and a belligerent look. His wife had just found him a steak. Said she: "With a beefsteak inside him, he can always win." She was right.

His opponent in Wimbledon's finals was Australia's ambidextrous Geoff Brown, 22, who serves righthanded, hits with his left hand on the left side, and with a two-handed grip on the right side. Petra, 30, onetime French infantryman who spent 18 months in a German prison camp, barked at ball boys, scowled at the linesmen, whooped when he won a point. He was not so much surly or unsportsmanlike as unable to contain himself. Both Petra and Brown had blinding serves. Seldom had so much power and so little finesse been seen in a Wimbledon finals. Petra's winning scores: 6-2, 6-4, 7-9, 5-7, 6-4.

After seven war years the men's singles were as spotty as critics had guessed they would be. But the standard of women's play was high. The women's tournament was dominated by a quartet of California girls, relentless in their success, who all reached the semi-finals of the women's singles.

Hefty, healthy Dorothy ("Dodo") Bundy wore down Britain's left-handed Kay Stammers Menzies, 32, not the player she once was but still the prettiest thing on the courts. Freckled, pudgy Margaret Osborne, a hard hitter, and Louise Brough (rhymes with rough), a big doe-eyed blonde, inseparable off the courts, were unbeatable as a doubles team. Best of the California four: hard-driving Pauline ("Bobby") Betz.

In the finals, Pauline sailed into fellow-Californian Brough, with Queen Mary and Prime Minister Clement Attlee looking on. She won, 6-2, 6-4. The doubles were a triple triumph for California:

P: Jack Kramer (TIME, July 8) and San Francisco's up-&-coming Tom Brown mowed down Australia's Dinny Pails and Geoff Brown, 6-4, 6-4, 6-2.

P: Osborne and Brough, who have not lost a national doubles championship match in four years, beat Betz and Doris Hart. Score: 6-3, 2-6, 6-3.

P: Brough and Tom Brown captured the mixed doubles from Geoff Brown and Bundy, 6-4, 6-4.

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