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235 pages

English

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Many of the earliest books, particularly those dating back to the 1900s and before, are now extremely scarce and increasingly expensive. We are republishing these classic works in affordable, high quality, modern editions, using the original text and artwork.

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Publié par	Read Books Ltd.
Date de parution	28 juin 2021
Nombre de lectures	0
EAN13	9781528764391
Langue	English
Poids de l'ouvrage	4 Mo

Informations légales : prix de location à la page 0,0500€. Cette information est donnée uniquement à titre indicatif conformément à la législation en vigueur.

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The Racquet Game
By
ALLISON DANZIG
With an Introduction by
HERBERT N. RAWLINS, J R .,
National Amateur Squash Racquets Champion, 1928; Metropolitan Champion, 1928 and 1929; Canadian Champion, 1929
Wide World Photos
The New York Racquet and Tennis Club, 370 Park Avenue, New York.
PREFACE
A LTHOUGH the American history of two of the games discussed in the pages that follow dates back more than fifty years and over a quarter of a century in the case of the other two, very little is known about them except by their players and immediate followers. This is owing in part to the strict privacy that has surrounded the championships and to the disinclination of those conducting them to make public spectacles of the matches. Particularly has this been true of court tennis and racquets.
Of recent years the barriers have been let down to some extent. While the general public still has little opportunity to witness them, all four games have grown vastly in popularity, and two of them, squash tennis and squash racquets, now draw their following from an ever widening circle instead of from the membership of a few exclusive clubs as was the case formerly.
The reason for the growing vogue of these games is not difficult to explain, in spite of the restrictions that have militated against it. They offer the opportunity for the business and professional man to get in half an hour or hour of invigorating exercise between or after office hours without the necessity of going out of the city, and during the winter season, when the lawn tennis courts and golf courses are closed, they furnish a physical outlet that is unexcelled in the enjoyment and exhilaration derived from playing these games.
In the opinion of the author, the time is not far distant when squash tennis and squash racquets will take their places among the most popular of winter diversions, although racquets and court tennis can hardly hope to gain so wide a following, because of the expense attached to them. That time will be hastened with the realization on the part of the public of the real character of the game of squash and of the fascination it holds for those who are fortunate enough to have been introduced to it.
It is with the purpose of aiding in the work of the National Squash Tennis Association and the United States Squash Racquets Association of bringing home this realization to those who know of squash tennis and squash racquets, if at all, only by name, and of narrating their hitherto untold history in America that this book has been undertaken, as well as to relate the story of their more exclusive and fascinating cousins, court tennis and racquets.
The American literature on these games is extremely limited. England and France have produced practically all that has been published between covers about court tennis and racquets, these works touching only in the barest way upon the games in the United States, while nothing has been written about the history of squash tennis and squash racquets. A few brief chapters in The Book of Sport, published in 1901, by J. F. Taylor and Company of New York; a handful of magazine articles, most of them printed in Outing , and a manual of instruction on court tennis and racquets, written in 1909 by Frederick C. Tompkins, professional to the Philadelphia Racquet Club, constitute the entire literary output on racquets and court tennis in America. For a comprehensive survey of their history in this country one will seek in vain, as he will also for even scraps of printed information about squash tennis and squash racquets, aside from two or three technical treatises. Indeed, it is even impossible to uncover a printed list of the national champions in racquets and court tennis unless one has access to English publications, while there is no published list in circulation of the champions in squash tennis. Only in squash racquets does the national association list the winners of its tournaments in a year book.
Because of the scarcity of published records, the author, in order to obtain the facts, has had no alternative but to seek the cooperation of those who have been identified with the early history of these games in America or who have preserved in their private collections magazine and newspaper cuttings from the years before their day. This co peration has been extended most generously, and if this work may lay claim to any merit or to serve any useful purpose it is only because of the interest and painstaking efforts that scores of amateurs and professionals in various parts of the country have made to obtain information from private sources that would have otherwise been inaccessible.
Before listing these players, to whom my obligations are so great, I wish first to make a few other acknowledgments. I wish to express particularly my debt to the Racquet and Tennis Club of New York for its courtesy in extending me permission to use its library, to Mr. Clarence C. Pell of New York, through whose kind offices this privilege was granted, and to Robert J. Henderson, of the New York Public Library, private librarian to the Racquet and Tennis Club, whose interest in the book and whose research work in assisting me to gather together my material was characteristic of one who has shown such zeal in helping to make the club s court tennis collection the finest in America.
To John Davis, manager at the Racquet and Tennis Club; to George Standing, retired racquet and court tennis master at the club, and to Frank Forester, formerly private tutor to Mr. Jay Gould and the late Mr. Payne Whitney at Georgian Court, Lakewood, and Greentree, Manhasset, L. I., respectively, go my thanks for many of the pictures in this work.
I wish to acknowledge, further, my appreciation of the courtesy extended by Mills and Boon, Ltd., of London, in permitting me to quote from their publication, First Steps to Rackets, and my indebtedness to the authors, the late Mr. E. B. Noel and the Hon. C. N. Bruce (now Lord Aberdare), for the information obtained from this work. To the Oxford University Press of London, the publishers, and to the late Mr. E. B. Noel and Mr. J. O. M. Clark, the authors of A History of Tennis, I make the same acknowledgments with grateful thanks.
Without the aid of the chapters on court tennis and racquets written in The Book of Sport by Eustace H. Miles of England, the late T. Suffern Tailer of New York, George Richmond Fearing, Jr., and Lawrence M. Stockton of Boston, Edward La Montagne of New York and Walter Rogers Furness of Philadelphia, it would have been impossible for me to have collected much of the information that is herein contained on the history of these two games prior to 1900. The chapters in The Badminton Library on court tennis and racquets have also been among my sources of information on the facts of these games in England prior to 1900.
In the second part of this work, which is devoted to the history of racquets, is included a separate chapter on racquets in Canada, written by Mr. Kenneth F. Gilmour of Montreal, one of the game s most loyal votaries in that country, and I wish to make public acknowledgment of my debt to him for his valued contribution.
I now list those who have assisted me in the work of collecting the material from which this history of the four games has been compiled. In New York: Clarence C. Pell, Clarence H. Mackay, Herbert N. Rawlins, Jr., Hewitt Morgan, John W. Prentiss, George M. Rushmore, Dr. Alfred Stillman, Arthur H. Lockett, E. M. Byers, Reginald Fincke, John W. Appel, Jr., Norman F. Torrance, John C. Neely, F. S. Keeler, E. W. (Ned) Putnam and Perry R. Pease.
In Boston: E. Ray Speare, to whom I am particularly indebted; Constantine Hutchins, Quincy A. Shaw, R. L. Agassiz, Amory Coolidge, Harold Jefferson Coolidge, Ralph A. Powers, Henry C. Clark, George F. Wales, Beals C. Wright, Charles C. Peabody, George B. Morison, George W. Wightman, Dr. Richard H. Miller, Frank W. Buxton, Philip Nichols and Walter I. Badger, Jr.
In Philadelphia: Joseph de V. Keefe, Sydney P. Clark and Frank B. Smith, who have been most generous with their help; Stanley W. Pearson, Frank White, Joseph W. Wear, George R. White, Harry C. Thayer, S. French Reeves, George H. Brooke, Harold A. Haines, E. H. LeBoutillier and Rodman E. Griscom. Also, Adrian W. Smith of Buffalo, R. W. Miller of Washington and Stanley S. Mills of Toronto, Canada.
Among the professionals to whom I am indebted for assistance are Fred Tompkins of the Philadelphia Racquet Club, who has given me invaluable help; Jock Soutar of the same club, George Standing, Eddie Rodgers and Frank Blow of the New York Racquet and Tennis Club, Punch Fairs, private instructor to Clarence H. Mackay at Roslyn, L. I.; Walter Kinsella of the Fraternity Club of New York, Frank Lafforgue of the Yale Club of New York, Frank Forester of Greentree, William (Blondy) Standing of Greentree, James Reid of the Crescent A. C. of Brooklyn, Stephen J. Feron, formerly of the Harvard Club of New York, Walter S. Gray of the Seabright (N. J.) Lawn Tennis and Cricket Club, William Ward of the Rockaway Hunting Club, New York, Robert Moore of the Montclair A. C., Montclair, N. J., Charles Williams of the Chicago Racquet Club, Harry Boakes, Jr., of the University Club of Chicago, Harry Cowles of Harvard University, Harry Thompson of the Boston Tennis and Racquet Club, William Pettitt of the Boston Athletic Association, Wallace F. Johnson of Philadelphia and George Healey of the Detroit Racquet and Curling Club.
To all of these the author makes this acknowledgment of his obligations with grateful appreciation.
A LLISON D ANZIG
Bayside, N. Y.,
Sept. 2, 1929.
INTRODUCTION
BY
H ERBERT N. R AWLINS , J R.
I was recently asked the question, What is the difference between Racquets, Squash Tennis and