Tennis Goes for Gold (or Silver, or Bronze): The Early Olympic Years
From 1896 to 1924, tennis was a key Olympic sport. Discover its evolution, historic moments, and the challenges that led to its 64-year absence from the Games.
Tennis is part of the first modern Olympic Games
In 1896, the Olympic Games begin anew in Athens, Greece. Due to its rising popularity around the world, tennis was one of nine inaugural sports contested.
Played in the Velodrome Stadium (after 5pm once the cycling events finished), Ireland's John Boland won the singles.
“The important thing in the Olympic Games is not to win, but to take part...To spread these principles is to build up a strong and more valiant and, above all, more scrupulous and more generous humanity.”
- Pierre de Coubertin, Founder of the International Olympic Committee, Father of the Modern Olympic Games
Women join the competition at the 1900 Paris Olympic Games
Expanding on the spirit of the games, women's singles and mixed doubles events were added. Great Britain swept all events. Charlotte Cooper (left) won women's singles and mixed doubles with Reggie Doherty. Laurie Doherty won men's singles and with Reggie won men's doubles.
Olympics and the World's Fair
The 1904 Olympic Games were held in St. Louis, Missouri, in conjunction with the 1904 World’s Fair. The tennis competition only saw two events, men’s singles and doubles, contested, and only one international player entered the field. The rest of the participants were Americans.
Two different tennis competitions in London
In 1908, for the first time, tennis had competition on covered wood courts (played at Queen’s Club in May), and then on grass in July at the All England Club (a week after the Wimbledon Championships finished). Not surprisingly, Great Britain swept all but two bronze medals.
A series of "firsts" for the Olympic Games
Featuring athletes from five continents, the 1912 Olympic Games featured electrical timing equipment, public address system, and the photo finish for the first time. Once again, tennis featured two different competitions, indoors on wood courts and outdoors on clay courts.
The indoor events were staged in May with six nations represented. They were played on two courts with black painted wood floors that only accommodated 400 spectators; this indoor event would be dropped at future games. Unfortunately, American Lawn Tennis magazine did not report on this event, likely because no Americans competed.
Top players choose Wimbledon over Stockholm Olympics
Though the outdoor tennis competition featured four clay courts, could accommodate 1,500 daily spectators, and welcomed players from 13 nations, the world's top players chose not to compete. One American, Theodore Pell competed; American Lawn Tennis did not report on the event.
First Olympic Games after World War I
With the VI Olympiad cancelled in 1916, the 1920 Antwerp Games saw 80 players from 13 nations. A conflict with the U.S. National Championships meant no Americans competed. Despite that, American Lawn Tennis provided one article about the men’s events only.
“Judged by the traditions of Wimbledon it could easily be argued that the organization of the Olympic lawn tennis tournament left much to be desired. For example, the close proximity of the Stadium to the Beerschot courts—within a javelin-throw in fact—meant that matches were decided amid ecstatic applause not intended for lawn tennis players and very disturbing to their nerves.” – A. Wallis Myers, tennis correspondent of the London Field as reported in American Lawn Tennis Magazine
1924 Paris Olympics – the beginning of the end for tennis?
The Olympic Games were seen as a major event with world-wide appeal. Twenty-eight nations featuring 82 men and 31 women competed in the five different tennis events.
However, there were a number of issues that would challenge the sport of tennis at future games.
Missing the top two players
The world’s two best players, Bill Tilden and Suzanne Lenglen, were absent due to a dispute with the United States Lawn Tennis Association (about writing tennis articles for American Lawn Tennis and others affecting his amateur status) and an illness, respectively.
1924 American Olympic Tennis Team (1924)International Tennis Hall of Fame
Despite no Tilden, the Americans sweep gold in all events
However, there was much dissatisfaction amongst the players and the national tennis associations reported about in leading newspapers, such as the New York Times, and magazines, including American Lawn Tennis.
The complaints were numerous
Unfinished stands and courts at the Games’ start, cheering from the main stadium affecting concentration, a primitive ladies’ dressing room, and the half-mile distance the men had to walk between their dressing area and the courts was unacceptable.
6,000 spectators attended the finals in 1924
Even with the sport’s popularity, the IOC and the International Lawn Tennis Federation could not see eye-to-eye. Subsequently the ILTF and its member nations chose to forgo future games, and tennis would not again be a full-medal sport at the Olympics for another 64 years.
The International Tennis Hall of Fame would like to thank the Wimbledon Lawn Tennis Museum for providing the image of Charlotte Cooper Sterry.
Image of Suzanne Lenglen and Bill Tilden (Library of Congress).
Image of headline from July 17, 1924 regarding the American tennis team's threat to quit the Olympic Games over unsatisfactory conditions (New York Times).
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