In 1990, Tennis Canada celebrated its centennial anniversary, and a book called Advantage Canada was published to tell the story of the first 100 years. [See footnote.]

In 2007, on becoming president of the Niagara-on-the-Lake Tennis Club, I revisited the book and was surprised to find a section describing the significant role played by Niagara-on-the-Lake in Canadian tennis history during the period from 1885-1925.

In 2009, Tady Saczkowski became interested in the history of the Welland Tennis Club. His research led him to the discovery that the club would celebrate 100 years in 2013, and he played a leading role in documenting the club’s history and ensuring the records would be available for the future.

Tady’s research into the history of tennis in the Niagara Peninsula also uncovered a wealth of information regarding early tennis in Niagara-on-the-Lake. Recognizing its importance and significance for the history of tennis in Canada, his resolve is to catalog the records and photographs such that future researchers and historians will have access to them. He continues to track down new leads and accumulate new data with perseverance and resourcefulness.

I’m most appreciative of Tady’s generosity in sharing many of his findings with me. I admire his enthusiasm for the project and would love to have the story become better known in Niagara-on-the-Lake and also within the greater Canadian tennis community.

But the task of compiling the details from such a long time period is a daunting one. The purpose of this blog is to break it down into bite-size pieces, describing small parts of the whole as we come to understand them. The objective is to share the stories and cultivate interest in them. Perhaps this will also lead to the discovery of other resources, hidden away in attics or scrapbooks.

And so a blog is born.

Footnote: ‘Advantage Canada’ was created at the instigation of John Beddington. As Executive Vice President of Tennis Canada, and as Tournament Director for its flagship events, John was responsible for orchestrating the rise of the Canadian Open to the top tier of international tennis. His impact during the 1980s and 1990s was enormous in many ways and on many fronts, among which was an appreciation for tennis history and its relevance to the modern day. As a member of the All-England Club, and as a noted collector with an exhaustive tennis library, perhaps this came naturally to him. But his work has left a grateful Canadian tennis community with a link to our origins that would likely not have existed without him.