Origin of The Term "Grand Slam"
Originating in the card game bridge, and used in golf since 1930, the term Grand Slam was first applied to tennis by New York Times columnist John Kieran according to Total Tennis, The Ultimate Tennis Encyclopedia by Bud Collins. In the chapter about 1933, Collins writes that after the Australian player Jack Crawford had won the Australian, French, and Wimbledon Championships, speculation arose about his chances in the U.S. Championships. Kieran, who was a bridge player, wrote: "If Crawford wins, it would be something like scoring a grand slam on the courts, doubled and vulnerable." Crawford, an asthmatic, won two of the first three sets of his finals match against Fred Perry, then tired in the heat and lost the last two sets and the match.
Read more about this topic: Grand Slam (tennis)
Famous quotes containing the words origin of the, origin of, origin, term, grand and/or slam:
“In the woods in a winter afternoon one will see as readily the origin of the stained glass window, with which Gothic cathedrals are adorned, in the colors of the western sky seen through the bare and crossing branches of the forest.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“There are certain books in the world which every searcher for truth must know: the Bible, the Critique of Pure Reason, the Origin of Species, and Karl Marx’s Capital.”
—W.E.B. (William Edward Burghardt)
“The essence of morality is a questioning about morality; and the decisive move of human life is to use ceaselessly all light to look for the origin of the opposition between good and evil.”
—Georges Bataille (1897–1962)
“Orlando. Who stays it still withal?
Rosalind. With lawyers in the vacation; for they sleep
between term and term, and then they perceive not how Time
moves.”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)
“The allurement that women hold out to men is precisely the allurement that Cape Hatteras holds out to sailors: they are enormously dangerous and hence enormously fascinating. To the average man, doomed to some banal drudgery all his life long, they offer the only grand hazard that he ever encounters. Take them away, and his existence would be as flat and secure as that of a moo-cow.”
—H.L. (Henry Lewis)
“You slam a politician, you make out he’s the devil, with horns and hoofs. But his wife loves him, and so did all his mistresses.”
—Pamela Hansford Johnson (1912–1981)