Janice Patricia Lehane was born 9th July 1941, the second daughter of Reub and Enid Lehane, and lived at Piney Range near Grenfell.
Reub was a successful tennis player in his era. In 1926 he won the South West Singles at Young, soon after he lost the fingers of his right hand in a chaff cutter accident. Undeterred, he taught himself to play left-handed, and won the South West Singles again in 1931.
Under Reub’s guidance Janice (Jan) began to play tennis at the age of six, and because of her size, used two hands on the backhand side.
She practiced for hours on hitting balls onto the brick chimney wall.
Jan attended Caragabal and Grenfell schools. She practiced every afternoon either at home or at the old St Joseph’s courts with local juniors Robert Chambers, Tony Bray, Don Kelly and Lloyd Logan.
She played her first tournament at Cowra aged 8 years.
She came to notice of Coach Vic Edwards in 1953, and in 1956 Jan went to Sydney to live at the Edwards' home for the next 6 years.
Jan won her first State title, the Under 13 Singles, a success she repeated in 1954, together with the Under 19 schoolgirls title and the Under 19 Hard court title at 12 years of age.
In 1958, Jan, now aged 17, won the Australian Under 19 Hardcourt, Grass court, NSW, Qld, South Australia and Victorian Junior Titles.
Overall, Jan captured 30 State Junior titles as well as two Australian Junior titles and three Australian Under 19 Hardcourt titles.
She was runner-up in NSW Open singles in 1958 and won this event in 1959. She was ranked No. 1 in Australia in 1960 and was runner-up at the Australian Open that year.
In April 1960 Jan ventured overseas for the first time, and when she appeared at Wimbledon was the first woman to use the two-handed backhand.
As one of the finest players to come from Australia, Jan won many overseas titles.
In 1973 Jan played in the inaugural World Teams Tennis in Toronto, Canada.
In 1966 she married Jim O’Neill and had one daughter Lisa, who also an accomplished player won Open Junior events at Wimbledon, USA and Australia, as well as Australian Hard-court Doubles.
Jan was made a Life Member of the NSW Tennis Association in 1995.
Jan was the 2002 Official Guest for The Henry Lawson Festival of Arts in Grenfell.
Jan O'Neill, (Lehane), OAM, was honoured by Grenfell when she was handed the 'Key to Grenfell' by the Mayor Maurice Simpson, at a Dinner held in her honour on Saturday, 27 April, 2012, for donating her trophies to the community.
In 2018 she was inducted into the Australian Tennis Hall of Fame.
On Australia Day, 2019, Jan was awarded the Medal of the Order of Australia (OAM) for her service to tennis.