Edgbaston Archery and Lawn Tennis Society, informally known as The Archery and based in the Edgbaston area of Birmingham, England, is the oldest lawn tennis club in the world.
The club was founded as an archery club called the Edgbaston Archery Society in 1860 following a meeting at the Birmingham and Midland Institute, and the club moved to its current premises next to Birmingham Botanical Gardens in 1867. The game of croquet was introduced from 1870, with the society's name being amended to reflect this.
It is not known exactly when tennis was established as part of the club's activities. The game itself was developed by Harry Gem and his friend Augurio Perera in Edgbaston between 1859 and 1865, but although Gem was a member of The Archery from 1864 to 1869 there is no proof that he directly introduced the game to the club in this period, and the short-lived tennis club that Gem and Perera established in Leamington Spa in 1872 is the first that can be shown to have existed. The Archery's fixture card for 1875 shows tennis to have been well-established by this date, however, which makes The Archery the oldest still to survive.
Read more about Edgbaston Archery And Lawn Tennis Society: External Links
Famous quotes containing the words lawn, tennis and/or society:
“You whig emblem, you woman chaser,
why do you dance over the wide lawn tonight
clanging the garbage pail like great silver bells?”
—Anne Sexton (1928–1974)
“I know some of my self-worth comes from tennis, and it’s hard to think of doing something else where you know you’ll never be the best. Tennis players are rare creatures: where else in the world can you know that you’re the best? The definitiveness of it is the beauty of it, but it’s not all there is to life and I’m ready to explore the alternatives.”
—Martina Navratilova (b. 1956)
“The longer we live the more we must endure the elementary existence of men and women; and every brave heart must treat society as a child, and never allow it to dictate.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)