He was launched in his tennis career by a neighbor in Lynchburg, Virginia, Dr. Robert Walter Johnson, who also mentored Arthur Ashe and Althea Gibson.
At the age of four Juan Farrow began hitting tennis balls interminably against a wall with a broomstick, under the tutelage of his neighbor, Dr. Johnson.
Since African-Americans were not allowed on the public courts in Virginia, Johnson sent Farrow, as he had Ashe, to Sumner High School in St. Louis to learn under the coaching of Richard Hudlin, a tennis star at the University of Chicago in the 1920s who helped break down racial barriers.
[4] Arthur Ashe and his friend Pancho Gonzales came to coach Farrow, who won Missouri state singles championships for Sumner High School in 1974, 1975, and 1976, and went on to star at Southern Illinois University Edwardsville (SIUE).
[8] His coach Kent DeMars[9] said of what Farrow did for the SIUE tennis program: “Juan's (presence) is what put our name on the map.