Volleys of 1941

For 50 years, tennis was a game that was played for the fun of it. Then came Big Bill Tilden. The greatest player the world had ever seen, he made the game a spectacle--a show well worth the price of admission.

Today tennis is still played for fun, but mostly by dubs, has-beens and never-will-bes. Many of those who play well enough to attract a crowd want to get paid for it. They sweat through amateur tournaments the year round to get their names in the papers, to enhance their box-office draw. The national championship, the goal of every U. S. amateur, is now also a convenient gateway to professionalism--the necessary first step to a barnstorming exhibition tour (for a guarantee of $25,000, $50,000 or $75,000).

Last week 12,000 tennis fans streamed into Manhattan's Madison Square Garden to see the opening show of the 1941 professional tennis tour, promoted, like its three predecessors, by Wilson Sporting Goods Co. For headliners, the producers had chosen two ingenues: U. S. Singles Champion Alice Marble (straight from a week's appearance in vaudeville at Broadway's Loew's State Theatre) and Britain's No. 1 woman player, Mary Hardwick, stranded in the U. S. since the outbreak of World War II. But the performer most of the crowd had come to see was Bill Tilden, the Old Master, in his age-defying act.

Big Bill, nigh on 48, has been playing big-time tennis for 28 years--18 as an amateur, then as a pro. Now, after spending three of the past four years barnstorming around Europe, the Old Master is reappearing on a cross-country U. S. tour, playing opposite Don Budge, who was still unborn when Tilden won his first national (mixed doubles) championship. Last week the Old Master's legs were slow, his timing not so good, but to an admiring gallery he proved that he still has a few aces up his sleeve, showed flashes of bygone brilliance before losing the match, 3-6, 4-6.

Few fans expect Big Bill to beat Budge many times during their four-and-a-half-month tour of 65 U. S. cities. Nor do they expect gallant Miss Hardwick to take many matches from Alice Marble. But for those who like to see a great artist on his last legs or a near-great artist on pretty legs, this year's tennis show is a good evening's entertainment.

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