Pam Wearne played Senior Pennant Tennis in SA soon after relocating from Melbourne. Through the 1990s, she held a top 5 ranking for nine years, also being awarded two Boyce Medals for outstanding play and sportsmanship.
Theoretically Pam Wearne is a Victorian and it was in Victoria that she earned the state’s No. 1 junior ranking. She was in her mid-30s when she moved to SA.
In 1953 at age 22, she reached the quarter finals of the Australian Open, ultimately losing to Grand Slam winner Maureen Connolly, known as Little Mo.
In the same year, she won the Mixed Doubles Hardcourt Championships of Australia. Those results sent her national ranking soaring to No. 4.
Just two years before that, Pam Wearne (nee Southcombe) had travelled across the border to take out the Women’s Singles and Doubles Championships of South Australia.
In 1966 Pam and her husband relocated their family to Adelaide and at that stage she became a tennis coach, encouraging and enabling hundreds of youngsters and adults to play the game.
In the 1970s she was appointed as the school’s tennis coach to the staff of Methodist Ladies College, which later became Annesley College. The Head Mistress of the time believed tennis was a social game that all students should be able to play.
Pam’s priorities as a coach were to teach the basic skills of the game, but also to appreciate the importance of tennis etiquette and sportsmanship. A firm handshake at the conclusion of a match was always emphasised.
Pam Wearne played Senior Pennant Tennis in South Australia soon after arriving in Adelaide through to the 1990s and held her place in the State’s top 5 ranked players for nine years. During this time, she was awarded two Boyce Medals for outstanding play and sportsmanship.
In 1981, and in the twilight of her career she was selected to represent Australia in the over 50s Maria Bueno Cup in Austria, where she was the runner up in the over 50 Doubles World Championships.
She continued playing the top-level Pennant Tennis and coaching into her 60s.
Pamela Wearne is an inductee in the Tennis SA Legends Club.
