Newport Casino Ball Shackers (Ball Boys)

Horizontal black and white photograph of a group of 21 boys, the Newport Casino Ball Boys (also known as Ball Shackers) from 1918. The boys are wearing dark sweaters that say "Casino" and have a number (different number for each boy) as ell as white caps. On the reverse of the photograph is a handwritten list identifying some of the boys. They include: (5) George Boyle; (6) "Flat Nose" Adamson; (44) (unidentifed) Murphy; (41) "Stew" Glen; (35) Woody Ring; (33) Lenny Desantis; (43) Lenny Desantis Brother; (19) Walter Pike; (14) Mucka Curran; (30) (unidentified) Finn; (45) Skelly Fagan; and (28) Skeet Lynch.

The Newport Casino hired several local boys each season to serve as ball boys. Called “Shackers”, these lads, most of whom were of Irish descent, served the patrons well. In his book Good Old Summer Days (1941), Richmond Barrett—son of Newport Casino superintendent Joseph Barrett—recalled that the boys were “highly recommended by their priest...but in spite of their impeccable standing in the parish, they looked and acted like hoodlums on the Casino turf.” Barrett went on to describe them as “slick little politicians,” and, “uncombed, unwashed, their stockings coming down, their sweaters ragged after a few days wear, the cardboard visors of their caps soon broken.”

On August 24, 1912, the Newport Casino management changed policy that seats were for public use and that they could not be reserved. Previously patrons paid the ball boys a “fee” to hold their chairs for them. In anger, the ball boys went on strike, walking out, causing the tournament play to be postponed. A local patrolman by the name of Casey had his hands full keeping a riot from erupting. Soon after, a committee was formed to review the issue, and ultimately it was decided that the ball boys could sell chairs—they promptly returned to work and the tennis action resumed.