APTA Honor Award: 7 more pioneers honored

James M. Carlisle: Carlisle served as APTA Secretary from 1955-1957, and as President from 1957-1959. A winner in as many different kinds of tournaments as anyone else in the early years of the game, he won the Men’s Nationals in 1955 and 1958 with Richard K. Hebard. He also won the first and second annual National Men’s 45+, in 1957 and 1958, a tournament that he is generally considered to have founded. (Fox Meadow Tennis Club).

Donald K. Evans: Among his many accomplishments, Donald K. Evans is best known for the backstop that shares his name. In designing and producing the Evan Backstop, he solved the major impediment to the enjoyment and expansion of the game—the inconsistent bounces of the ball off the wires. He designed and built the freestanding taut wiring that is officially used today. The first installation was on Jimmy Cogswell’s court in Scarsdale, NY, during the winter of 1934-1935. (Fox Meadow Tennis Club).

Harold D. Holmes: Harold Holmes was affectionately known as “Mr. Paddle of New Jersey” for his tireless efforts on behalf of the game in that state. A member of the Tremont Place Paddle Tennis Club in Orange, NJ, he also served as APTA’s second President from 1938-1939. (Englewood Field Club, NJ).

Barbara Bixler Koegel: Barbara Koegel was an accomplished tennis player who started playing platform tennis when she was in her mid-thirties in 1955, and won the National Women’s the following year and the National Mixed with A. H. (Zan) Carver, Jr. in 1964. She retired from competitive play in 1965 for health reasons. At her home club, Fox Meadow, she devoted time and talent to developing the skills of new players, which helped raise the level of women’s play. (Fox Meadow Tennis Club).

Charlotte McNeill Lee: Charlotte Lee made a mark in tennis before becoming an outstanding platform tennis champion, despite only starting to play the game in her early forties. Playing with a variety of partners, she won three straight National Mixed (1961-1963), and then again in 1965, and five National Women’s (1961, 1963, 1964, 1966, and 1967). She was a master tactician of the game. (Short Hills Country Club, NJ).

Frederick B. Walker: Frederick Walker served as APTA Secretary-Treasurer from 1948-1950, and as President from 1951-1953. In partnership with Dick Hebard, he won three National Men’s in 1949, 1951, and 1952, and was considered a master of the “drop shot” in his day, with one of the hardest forehands (Fox Meadow Tennis Club). He was the son-in-law of Fessenden Blanchard and his wife, Ruthie, was a very accomplished player in her own right, and a finalist in the National Women’s in 1956 and 1959.(Fox Meadow Tennis Club).

Marie Walker: Walker won five straight Women’s Nationals with Madge Beck from 1938-1942. They likely would have won more but the Women’s Nationals was not played from 1943-1945 because of travel difficulties during World War II and then not reinstated until 1949. (Fox Meadow Tennis Club).