Passport Scotch Platform Tennis Classic – Graebner/Russell and Hilton/Gengler take the highest prize money yet in history of the game

Orange Lawn Tennis Club in New Jersey hosted the $50,000 Passport Scotch Platform Tennis Classic event. [Official Program]

The first-year team of Clark Graebner and Doug Russell won the biggest money prize in platform tennis history by capturing the men’s division. They defeated the Baird brothers, Chip and Steve, and split a prize of $8,000.

The 1978 national champions, Louise Gengler and Hilary Hilton, took the women’s title, and a record $8,000. They defeated the second-seeded team of Wendy Chase and Linda Wolf.

Source: Paddle Talk, Vol. 3 No. 6 (June-July)

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Golden anniversary of platform tennis celebration at Fox Meadow

Golden anniversary of founding of platform tennis celebrated at Fox Meadow

The event was chaired by Joan and and Paul Doyle, with assistance from Roxanne and Rodman Zilenziger and twenty-two other members.

Charlie O’Hearn—who with his wife, Ginnie, won four national Mixed Doubles championships— recalled the game’s origins:

“No paddle tennis player in the early thirties could have dreamed how far the game would develop over the ensuing fifty years. And yet it was such a great, fun game that perhaps we should have known. With one court in Scarsdale, at Jim Cogswell’s, only a handful of players were available and many a weekend I can recall Fess Blanchard phoning to say, ‘It’s stopped snowing. Come on over and help shovel, and we can be playing by two o’clock’—and we were. I haven’t played for years, but I still owe the game a lot. I’ll always be in its debt for the pleasure it gave to Ginnie and me.”

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

1978 Men's Nationals Program Brochure

50th Anniversary National Championships

1978

FMTC hosted the event (its 41st National Championship) commemorating the 50th anniversary of the founding of platform tennis.

The highlight of the afternoon was the presentation of sterling silver trays by APTA President Dick Hornigold to members of the “first families” of platform tennis, Mrs. Fessenden Blanchard and Do Cogswell Deland.
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In the Men’s, Herb Fitz Gibbon and Hank Irvine won their second straight title as did Hilary Hilton and Louise Gengler in the Women’s. Paddle Talk covered the event

Clark Graebner (Russell’s partner in the Men’s final) and Louise Gengler (Hilton’s partner in the Women’s) won the mixed over Russell and Hilton.

In the Senior’s, Bob Brown won his first of many Senior titles with George Reynolds over the winners of the past two years, Baird and Lankenau.

Source: Paddle Talk Vol. 3 No. 5 (April-May)

International Tournaments – First British and European Opens

British Open International Platform Tennis Tournament – February 3, 4, 5.

An invitation International Tournament under the joint auspices of the International Platform Tennis Association and the BPTA, to be held at Silvermere Country Club, Redhill Road, Cobham, Surrey. Sponsored by Racquet Sports International Limited. Teams from the United States, Holland and the United Kingdom.

The First European Open Championships – February 10, 11, 12.

Hapert, Holland, the site of last year’s Dutch Open Championships. Sponsored by Bellfires Corporation and its President, Nico de Wal. Teams from the United States, United Kingdom and Holland.

Program and Drawsheets

British National Platform Tennis Championships

Sponsored by En-tout-cas Limited, it involved regional competitions at a number of centers for all entrants, culminating in a National Final for regional winners. Men’s, women’s and mixed tournaments.

Source: Paddle Talk, Vol.3 No. 3 (January)

William E. Pardoe (1912 – 1978)

Former paddle champion and Hall of Fame member Bill Pardoe died on February 10 at his home in Stratton, VT, at the age of 62.

A graduate of Brigham Young University and Fordham Law School, he was senior vice president and senior financial officer for the Union Carbide Corporation.

Bill Pardoe and his partner, George Harrison, won the National Men’s Doubles championship in 1956 and again in 1960. He won the National Mixed Doubles with Charlotte Lee in 1965. In the Senior Men’s Doubles, he and his partner George Lowman won the championship three years in a row – 1966, ’67 and ’68.

In 1969, William Pardoe received the APTA Honor Award given to those individuals who have made significant contributions to the game of platform tennis.

Source: Paddle Talk, Vol. 3 No. 5 (April-May)