Robert Lindley Murray

Robert Lindley Murray: Niagara Falls's Reluctant US Tennis Champion presents the biography of a Stanford University chemical engineer and middle-distance runner who conquered the world of tennis in the early part of the twentieth century. Sent east by Stanford in 1914, Robert Lindley Murray electrified the Eastern tennis community by beating top intercollegiate players, winning several tournaments, and earning fourth place in the national ranking. After winning the 1916 US Indoor title in February, he cast his lot with Hooker Electrochemical in Niagara Falls, New York, that September. Murray was reluctant to play in the 1917 and 1918 national championships due to wartime contracts, but Hooker's president persuaded him to play those events anyway. He won them both, the latter over Bill Tilden after only eight days' intense practice. This biography sheds light not only on Murray, but also on most of the outstanding male and female tennis players with whom he competed, as well as earlier tennis luminaries of a bygone era, before shorts and skirts replaced flannels and petticoats.