ABSTRACT
This chapter shows that abandonment of these taboos—so intimately a part of the Anglo-American, Victorian ideals in which amateur tennis had its roots—were partially responsible for the coming of open tennis at Wimbledon in 1968. The twenty-two gentlemen who played in the first Wimbledon champi-onship in 1877 quite naturally exhibited a wide variety of strokes as well as racquets. Spencer Gore, an old Harrovian racquets player, was the first Wimbledon Champion. The Marylebone Cricket Club, the Kremlin of that national game, watched the growth of lawn tennis with some apprehension. Not only had tennis players adopted the white shirt and white flannel uniform of cricket, but the new game was also threatening to cut into cricket's popularity. The Searses spent many summers at Dark Harbor, in Maine. Richard built a tennis court there about 1897 and held an invitation tournament every summer for his friends. The players were largely undergraduates or alumni of Harvard, Princeton, and the University of Pennsylvania.
