Jack Kramer (tennis player)
|
Jack Kramer as an amateur in 1947 |
John Albert Kramer (born
August 1,
1921, in
Las Vegas,
Nevada) was a champion U.S.
tennis player of the
1940s. The
World No. 1 player for a number of years, he is a possible candidate for the title of the greatest tennis player of all time. He was also, for many years, the leading promoter of the professional tennis tours and a relentless advocate for the establishment of
Open tennis between amateur and professional players. Tall and slim, he was the first world-class player to play a consistent
serve-and-volley game, in which he came to the net behind all of his serves, including the second serve. He was particularly known for his powerful serve and forehand, as well as his ability to play "percentage tennis", in which he maximized his efforts on certain points and certain games during the course of a match.
Kramer was the son of a blue-collar railroad worker for the
Union Pacific railroad. As a boy he was a fine all-round athlete, particularly in basketball and tennis. When he was 13, the family moved to
San Bernadino,
California, and after seeing
Ellsworth Vines, then the world's best player, play a match Kramer decided to concentrate on tennis.
|
Kramer (left) with Frank Sedgman (right), in Australia in the early 1950s |
Within a year he was playing junior tournaments and taking lessons from a leading professional,
Dick Skeen. Because of his obvious ability, in spite of his family's lack of money he had also come under the guidance of
Perry T. Jones, the leading member of the
Los Angeles Tennis Club and of the Southern California Association, the centers of American tennis in the 1930s. Kramer commuted many hours each day from his new home in
Montebello to play at the LATC and the Beverly Hills Tennis Club, sometimes with such great adult players as Vines and
Bill Tilden. He was the national boys' champion in
1936 and the winner of the
1938 Interscholastics. He was also competing occasionally in men's tournaments on grass courts in the East and winning matches against nationally ranked men such as
Elwood Cooke.
In his
1979 autobiography, Kramer calls
Helen Wills Moody the best women's tennis player he ever saw. He writes that when he was "the national boys' champion, fifteen years old," he played a match against her. "She was the champion of the world at the time -- she won seven
Forest Hills and eight
Wimbledons.... I beat her, but Helen played a good game."
Kramer attended
Rollins College in
Winter Park,
Florida, and played on the tennis team there for at least the 1941 and 1942 seasons.
Kramer was inducted into the
International Tennis Hall of Fame in
Newport, Rhode Island, in
1968.
Wimbledon Championships*
Singles champion:
1947*
Doubles champion:
1946,
1947U.S. Championships*
Singles champion:
1946,
1947*Singles finalist: 1943
*
Doubles champion:
1940,
1941,
1943,
1947*
Mixed Doubles champion:
1941 *Mixed Doubles finalist: 1940
*
Champion:
1939,
1946,
1947Wins (3)
| Year | Championship | Opponent in Final | Score in Final |
| 1946 | U.S. Championships | Thomas "Tom" Brown, Jr. | 9-7, 6-3, 6-0 |
| 1947 | Wimbledon Championships | Thomas "Tom" Brown, Jr. | 6-1, 6-3, 6-2 |
| 1947 | U.S. Championships (2)| Frank Parker | 4-6, 2-6, 6-1, 6-0, 6-3 | |
Runner-ups (1)
| Year | Championship | Opponent in Final | Score in Final |
| 1943 | U.S. Championships | Joseph "Joe" Hunt | 6-3, 6-8, 10-8, 6-0 |
*
The Game, My 40 Years in Tennis (
1979), Jack Kramer with Frank Deford (ISBN 0-399-12336-9)
*
Tennis Hall of Fame profile
