The game makes its way to the Wild West and starts to flourish with the help of a Blanchard daughter

Historical Factoid: The West is now in today's Region VI but it was a tortuous journey. The APTA established Regions in 1976 and at the time Region IV covered the Mid-West to the West Coast. Around 1978/79 Region V was created to cover the Far-West. In 1983 Region VI was established, covering lower Ontario and western New York. Finally, in 1989 the APTA reorganized Region boundaries and created a new Region V (Mid-Western States) from the former Region IV and the Western and Far West States were designated as Region VI

In 1964, Peter Dominick (Colorado US Senator from 1963-1975) was working on subdividing a family farm in Cherry Hills Village (just south of Denver) and set aside a parcel for a family swim and tennis club. Hig Gould ¹, a transplant from the East and related to Dominick through marriage, was working of the subdivision that was to include the club, now know as the Arapahoe Tennis Club, and persuaded the other founders to include two platform tennis courts.

The game started to flourish there and was helped by the arrival of Fess Blanchard’s daughter, Ruth, who moved there after the death of her husband Fred Walker (Hall of Fame 1966) in 1964. Ruth Walker Johnson was an accomplished player having been a finalist in the 1956 and 1959 Women’s Nationals.

Note 1: Gould was a stand-out hockey player at St Paul’s and Yale. After graduation from Yale he did two years of active duty in the Naval Reserve – during which he was an alternate on the 1956 U.S. Olympic Hockey Team and, in 1957, a member of the U.S. National Hockey Team which toured Europe- which were followed by study at the Harvard School of Business Administration.

Upon receiving his M.B.A. degree in 1959, he accepted one of many offers from firms in the Southwest and Mountain States, and moved to Denver to take a position in the venture capital department of Bosworth, Sullivan & Co., investment bankers. Later, he joined the Gates Rubber Company, becoming assistant to the president for corporate planning and then president of Gates Aviation Corporation. When the company was merged with Learjet, he was named vice-president and finally, last fall, president of Gates Learjet Corporation.
Source: St Paul’s School Alumni News