Information about the Club is sparse between 1886 and 1913, when a new regime of record-keepers and minutes-takers took charge.

There are some tantalizing fragments of information, however. Women were not only members before the 1913 reorganization; they also served on the Board of Governors, and one woman was president of the Club for at least two years, 1907 and 1909.

Her election was described in a 1907 Scarsdale Inquirer:

“Owing to an oversight, we have omitted any account of the annual meeting of the Scarsdale Lawn Tennis Club, which took place on the third Thursday of April, at the residence of Colonel Crane. Mr. Alexander M. Crane, the president, directed the meeting. The following officers were elected:

President, Miss Hopeton Drake Atterbury; vice-president, Rupert W. K. Anderson; secretary, Harry Van Cortlandt Fish; treasurer, Robert Campbell Winmill; governing committee, Alexander M. Crane, Miss Isabel F. Atterbury, Rev. L. R. Schuyler, Charles C. D. Gott, John H. Hyatt.”

Source: Diana Reische, Fox Meadow Tennis Club – The First Hundred Years, 1983

Scarsdale Inquirer May 5, 1904

Hopeton Atterbury’s connections illustrate both the family nature of Fox Meadow Tennis Club and the continuity of many family ties with the organization.

The Club’s only woman president (1907-1909) to date¹ was one of seven Atterbury daughters at “Woodlands,” a twenty-five-acre estate off the Baraud extension of Drake Road just over the New Rochelle border. A niece recalls her as a champion horsewoman and a commanding presence.

Hopeton Atterbury married Club member William Quaid, one of Theodore Roosevelt’s Rough Riders in the Spanish-American War, and both remained active members of Fox Meadow.

Quaid’s sister Vera married Francis (Frank) Ayres, a president of the Club from 1916 to 1919.

Hopeton Atterbury’s sister Isabel was the mother of member Anne Sanford.

Source: Diana Reische, Fox Meadow Tennis Club – The First Hundred Years, 1983

NOTE 1: Since Diana Reische wrote the book three other women have served as president, Barbara Wood (1989-1991), Sally D. Rogers (1998-2000), and Catherine C. Souther (2008-2010)

Only incomplete records survive of tennis tournaments in the Club’s first three to four decades.

The earliest tournament mentioned in The Scarsdale Inquirer, which began publishing in 1901, was a Men’s Singles in July 1902. The entry fee was ten cents, and nonmembers were invited to participate. The prize, a watch fob, went to A. W. Kelly.

Champions mentioned in the intermittent reports of this era include Lou Tibbitts, Rupert Anderson, and Mary Howard. In 1904 Maude Gunning defeated Mary Howard to become the women’s champion, and Samuel Swift defeated Rupert Anderson to become the men’s champion. Isabel Atterbury collected several trophies during the early 1900s.

We do not have to imagine how the gallery looked on a day when the Club held a tournament, for a series of photos taken around 1895 captures the scene. On a slight rise above the tennis courts, spectators used their tandems, pony carts, and sulkies as mobile grandstands to watch the play.

Later, Club Historian Charles Barnes wrote, “Of a bright summer’s Saturday afternoon, here would gather the social lights not only of the community, but from surrounding towns as far as White Plains, Rye, Bronxville, etc., making a most colorful scene.”

Source: Diana Reische, Fox Meadow Tennis Club – The First Hundred Years, 1983

Scarsdale Inquirer August 4, 1904