Sporting Gentlemen: Men's Tennis from the Age of Honor to the Cult of the Superstar

464 Pages·1999·18.673 MB·English

by  E. Digby Baltzell

^ Men’s Tennis ^
from the Age of Honor to the
Cult of the Superstar
II.S. S30.00
Can. S40.00
Tennis in the 1990s is a high-stakes game,
played by prodigies who are identified at early
ages and coached by professionals in hopes of
generous prizes, high rankings, and lucrative
endorsements. But this commercial world is far
removed from the origins of the sport—it was
only in 1968 that Wimbledon invited profes¬
sional players to compete for the first time in its
90-year history. Before 1968, tennis was part of
a rich tradition of amateur sportsmanship, a tra¬
dition that stressed character, not money; that
produced educated, well-rounded gentlemen,
not one-dimensional specialists; that expressed
a code of honor, not commerce.
In this authoritative and affectionate history
of men’s tennis, distinguished sociologist E.
Digby Baltzell recovers the full glory of the lost
amateur age. From the aristocratic origins of the
sport in the late 19th century, to the Tilden
years, and through a succession of newcom¬
ers—the French musketeers, the California
boys, and the Australians of the ’50s and ’60s—
the amateur era and its virtues survived a centu¬
ry of democratization and conflict. Sporting
Gentlemen is filled with fascinating discus¬
sions of the greatest players and matches in the
history of tennis. Baltzell is especially concerned
with the tennis code of honor and its roots in
the cricket code of the late-nineteenth-century
Anglo-American upper class, at the English
public schools and the colleges at Oxford and
Cambridge, as well as at the New England
boarding schools and Harvard, Yale, and
Princeton in America. This aristocratic code of
honor remained in force throughout the ama¬
teur era, in spite of the democratization of ten¬
nis after 1930. Thus the court manners of the
Renshaw twins and Doherty brothers at the Old
Wimbledon and of Dick Sears and Dick
Williams at Newport were upheld to the letter
by Don Budge and Jack Kramer as well as Rod
Laver, John Newcombe, and Arthur Ashe (who
won his only U.S. Singles title in 1968, as an
amateur). Baltzell’s final chapter on the Open
Era is a blistering attack on the decline of honor
and civility, especially in America, where dis¬
tinctions based on class have been obliterated,

sporting Gentlemen
Men's Tennis from the
Age of Honor
to the
Cult of the Superstar
E. Digby Baltzell
981781
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Copyright © 1995 by E. Digby Baltzell
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Baltzell, E. Digby (Edward Digby)
Sporting gentlemen: men’s tennis from the golden age of
amateurism to the cult of the superstar / E. Digby Baltzell.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 0-02-901315-1
1. Tennis—History. 2. Tennis—Social aspects. 3. Tennis
players—Conduct of life. I. Title.
GV992. B35 1995
796.342—dc20 94-41401
CIP
The author wishes to thank the following for permission to reprint material included in this book;
Simon & Schuster Inc., for quotations from Covering the Court; copyright © 1968 by A1 Laney.
Sterling Lord Literistic, Inc., for quotations from Don Budge: A Tennis Memoir; copyright © 1969
by Frank Deford.
McIntosh and Otis, Inc., for quotations from The Scandalous Mr. Bennett, by Richard O’Connor;
copyright © 1962 by Richard O’Connor; copyright renewed 1990 by Olga O’Connor.
The Economist, for excerpts from the article “Different Ballgames,” published September 25,
1993; copyright © 1993 by The Economist Newspaper, Inc.
Tennis Week, for quotations from “King Borg Reigns for Fifth Year at Wimbledon,” by Richard
Evans, published July 17, 1980; copyright © 1980 by Tennis Week, Inc.
William F. Talbert, for quotations from Playing for Life; copyright © 1958 by William F. Talbert.
Frank Deford, for quotations from The Game, by Jack Kramer; copyright © 1979 by Frank Deford.
For my darling wife, Jocelyn,
and my tennis friends, living and dead, among them:
Butch Greene, Princeton jock and my teenage idol at the
Mantoloking Yacht Club, Bill Clothier, Al Sulloway, Mac Muir,
Haven Waters, Charlie Dick, Cal Chapin, Arthur Stanwood Pier,
Donald Unger-Donaldson, John Rummery, Freddie Godley,
Tom Rutledge, Bob Miller, Vince Hopkins, Robert Strausz-Hupf
Jim Cox, Bill DeWitt, Howard Fussell, John Thomas, Frank Koniecho,
David Lavin, Chris Busa, Fred Roll, Max Silverstein, Jack Appel, Ed Thayer,
Howard York, Tom Townsend, John Clark; and Nancy Ritchie,
Hope Knowles, and Nori Delamos.
Thus, to comprise all my meaning in a single proposition, the dissimi¬
larities and inequalities of men gave rise to the notion of honor; that
notion is weakened in proportion as these differences are obliterated,
and with them it would disappear.
—^Alexis de Tocqueville
Certain values and standards that had bonded players in my earher
years as a professional—certain codes of honor and a spirit of cooper¬
ation and camaraderie—disappeared. In some ways, the youngest
players arrived in a world in which the very concept of values and stan¬
dards was unknown or quaint and obsolete, like wooden racquets or
white tennis balls on which ^JC^bledon insisted long after the superi¬
ority of color had been demonstrated.
—^Arthur Ashe
Contents
f
List of Figures vii
Acknowledgments ix
Prologue xi
1. Introduction; Leveling Upwards and Leveling Downwards 1
2. The Anglo-American Amateur Tradition, the Making of a National
Upper Class, and a Gentlemanly Code of Honor in America,
1880-1914 13
3. The Rise of Lawn Tennis: The Harrow and Harvard Era,
1877-1887 37
4. The Expansion of Lawn Tennis in an Age of Innocence,
1887-1912 63
5. Class Complacency Challenged in 1912: The Sinking of the
Titanic and the First California Invasion of the Eastern
Grass Court Circuit 83
6. The Old Order Changes: Amateurism Becomes an Issue,
the Davis Cup Goes Down Under in 1914, and the
Championships Are Moved from Newport to Forest Hills 103
7. Two Philadelphia Gentlemen; William J. Clothier,
Father and Son 129
V
vi • Contents
8. Racism and Anti-Semitism: The Gentlemen’s Achilles Heel 147
9. William Tatum TUden 11: A Philadelphia Gentleman as
World Champion 163
10. The Finest Five Years in Tennis History: The French
Musketeers Finally Topple Ttlden 185
11. Big Bill Tilden: A Gentleman Possessed by Genius 203
12. The Grass-Court Circuit Becomes a Melting Pot, and
Perry Jones Leads a Second California Invasion of the
Eastern Establishment 219
13. Gentleman Jack Crawford of AustraUa, and Fred Perry,
the Last Great EngHshman 249
14. Budge and the Baron: The Greatest Match of them AH and
the Eirst Grand Slam 277
15. Indian Summer of a Golden Age: Riggs, Kramer, Gonzales,
and the Pro Tour 303
16. Lean 'Vears in American Tennis and the Reign of Harry
Hopman’s Australians 323
17. The Great Revolution of 1968-1992: The Rise of Open (Pro)
Tennis and the Decline of Civility 339
Epilogue 381
Notes 399
Index 409