Life — August 16, 1928 — page 23: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

15 o— The Tilden Controversy Tuat ancient fable about thunderstorms being nothing but Hendrik Hudson and his crew of the “Half Moon” playing at bowls up in the Catskill Mountains has been cast into the discard. Nowa- days when the heav- ens are rent and loud peals go echoing down the countryside the modern sports follower, wise in his generation, merely cocks an car and murmurs: “Aha! Bill Tilden and the tennis officials are at it again.” There have been some boisterous battles over the amateur question this simmering summer and, once the opening shot is heard, it never takes long for the firing to become general. All sorts of people come a-running to join the riot and inno- cent bystanders are laid out in long rows. Few of the many who join in the debate have any clear idea of the points at issue. That merely adds to the fun and fury. Unless there was a mistake somewhere in the translation, it was Mlle. Suzanne Lenglen who said, after she had turned professional, that the distinction between amateurs and professionals in tennis was social in England, financial in France and imaginary in America. In the lan- guage of Béranger: “Halte-la! Vite en prison pour celal” Que diable! It’s a fre state of affairs when a man can’t play tennis all over this and other countries the year around with- out having suspicious and pernicious per- sons hinung that he must be a_profes- sional, Though he may have no visible means of support except a racquet, it’s impertinent to bring up the question of where he gets the money to live on. Another point: Bill Tilden didn’t fall afoul of the tennis association because he gave up his professional career on the stage to devote himself entirely to an amateur game. Far from it. It was at the behest and also the expense of the tennis association that Tilden did all that. It was all done for the sacred cause of amateur tennis and the gate money went into the equally sacred coffers of the tennis asso- ciation, But it was when Tilden tried to earn a little money on the side by writing ar- ticles that the heavy hand of the law fell on him. Regardless of Tilden’s inno- cence or guilt in that matter, the tennis association seems to have strained at a gnat after swallowing a whole cluster of camels with great complacency. Donning a close-fituing suit of Syden- ham armor, one might venture further into the No Man's Land of open debate and say that the whole amateur tennis system is wrong, beginning with the pay- ing of expenses which allows players to gallivant around the country year in and year out, and continuing on up to the Davis Cup campaign which requires a group of amateurs to abandon farm and fireside, hearth and home, work and study, for five full months in order to race across a number of courts in pur- suit of a silver trophy. Tennis officials insist that these prac- Movern Youncster: Step on it, Mamma, or the lights will be against us! tices built up the game to its present popu- larity. Perhaps so, but golf built itself up without any such debatable methods. (For some strange reason, comparisons between golf and tennis always infuriate tennis officials.) In any event, the aforesaid system led directly to the bitter wrench warfare of the now waning summer. If tennis people are sat- isfied with it, why should anyone else worry? Compara- tively few ciuzens are star players or tennis officials. The great majority, there- fore, can stand on the sidelines and derive considerable amusement from watching them swing at each other's heads. And, incidentally, it is a great thing for the cause of international amity that Tilden, after being reinstated as a result of France's gracetul gesture, failed to carry the joke too far by winning back the Davis Cup. John Kieran. OUTCLASSED Preacner: You must conquer your- self. I conquered myself when I was about your age. Jones: Well, you see, parson, I'm a harder man to lick than you are. comicbooks.com