Tennis Chief

Some 40 years ago a Manhattan youngster named Walter Merrill Hall used to run from his front yard to the Hamilton Grange Tennis Club next door and peep through the fence at his father playing there. At 13 he learned to play. At 15, Walter Merrill Hall quit school, went to work as a Wall Street runner to help support his mother and grandmother. But every morning, every evening he practiced his tennis, developed a powerful forehand drive, a smashing backhand "down the line." At 24, Walter Merrill Hall was national clay court doubles champion. At 30 he came within two points of beating Bill Tilden in the national singles, might have done so if rain had not blurred his spectacles. At 45, last summer, he won the New Hampshire State championship. Last week his devotion to the game brought its high reward when he was nominated for the presidency of the U. S. Lawn Tennis Association with election in February a foregone conclusion. The selection of Mr. Hall, now a part ner in the Wall Street firm of Callaway, Fish & Co., was applauded by many a tennist not only because he is an active tournament player, but because he achieved high rank in his day against practical difficulties. In all his career he took only two weeks vacation each year, made it coincide with the dates of the tournament in which he wanted to play. Between 1911 and 1918 he rose from No. 10 to No. 4 of national singles players. In 1912, he and Harold H. Hackett won the national clay court doubles championship. He was thrice winner of the Middle States Singles Championship (1911-18-19), twice runner-up in the National Clay Court Singles.

Six years ago Mr. Hall withdrew from heavy competition, applied himself to the executive phase of the sport. He was for three years president of the West Side Tennis Club at Forest Hills, L. I., three years treasurer of U. S. L. T. A. and a member of the Davis Cup Committee.

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