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Local woman working to raise funds for state-of-the-art tennis facility

INDIANAPOLIS (WISH) –  Local tennis icon Barbara Wynne is pulling out all the stops to raise funds for a new tennis facility on the north side.

It would mean kids could play tennis all year round. It’s called the “Build The Dome” project and Wynne is trying to raise more than $4 million for it. Currently, they are about halfway to that goal.

Indianapolis was once known as a home for big-time tennis. With a world-class,10,000-seat stadium court on IUPUI’s campus, Indianapolis even hosted an ATP event, the RCA Championships, but it was tore down in 2010.

Wynne says she still misses that center and has spent her lifetime promoting the game’s benefits and Arthur Ashe’s vision of using tennis as a way to gain and hold the attention of young people. Now in her 80s, she’s still relentlessly perusing her dream of  eight courts, indoors, near the current Indianapolis Community Tennis program’s center on North Central High School’s campus.

“So we want to put in an eight-court indoor facility that has smart courts that are fully streamed so people can watch the competitions from all over the world,” said Wynne. “It will help us get back that Jimmy Conners, John McEnroe and Pete Sampras. We want to get some tough men playing again, not that there aren’t plenty of good ones but we want to produce a great one and we will produce a great one.”

The dome will not be a racquet club with expensive memberships and dues. It will be a community resource open to all, with an emphasis on providing court time to children.

If you think your child wants to get involved, head to the 29th Annual Summer Camp Fair Feb. 17 at Castleton Square Mall. They are trying to get construction started on the dome soon in order to open next winter.

In addition to this story, Barbara’s husband,John Watterson Wynne, passed away on Feb. 13.  If you would like to pay your respects to the family here is a link to the obituary.