#52 Ancestors Week 42 Sports: Frank Scrivener Tennis Champion

 My Dad, Frank Philip Scrivener III, learned to play tennis at a young age when he attended Newman Preparatory School in New Jersey.  The sport became his lifelong passion.  Growing up, our house was filled with loving cups, silver trays and trophies collected from Dad's tennis tournaments.  In spring, summer, and fall, we often spent the weekend travelling to various venues in the mid-Atlantic to watch Dad play tennis, or to otherwise amuse ourselves while he played.  Fortunately, a lot of the places had swimming pools. Watching a tennis match could be a very hot activity and not all that exciting for kids to watch, so we were grateful when we could retreat to the pool. 

Dad was born in Baltimore MD in 1925. His grandmother, Louise Gwynn, arranged for him (her oldest grandchild and namesake of her husband and son) to attend the exclusive Newman Prep, a Catholic school for boys in New Jersey, also the alma mater of F. Scott Fitzgerald, somewhat earlier than my Dad's time there.  

That's my Dad, aged about 12, in the spiffy blazer and striped tie in the front row. 

Having learned the game at Newman, Dad went on to Calvert Hall High School in Baltimore, where his nickname was "Hank."  He was the captain and manager of the tennis team. 

When Dad enlisted in the Army in 1943, he took his tennis skills with him, and the Army had him playing tennis matches and other sports in Europe in between military missions.   Along with his dog tags, he carried several medals for tennis, touch football and table tennis. 

When he returned from WWII, Dad married Anne Summers in 1947.  According to Mom, Dad scheduled their honeymoon at the location of a tennis tournament where he was planning to play.  But Mom got the last laugh on that one because the tournament was cancelled.  Dad was a lefty with a devastating back-hand and good enough that he had the opportunity to turn pro, but fate intervened in the form of the birth of his first child, me, and he turned down a pro career. 

 In the meantime, he used the GI Bill to attend Loyola College in Baltimore, where he was again captain of the tennis team and got to show off his beautiful baby girl, while racking up wins for the Greyhounds.  That's him the back row, below, second from the right, wearing his letter sweater. 

"Talent? That little commodity seems to be taken care of inasmuch as several of the racqueteers who
did such a near-perfect job last year are still in Green-and-Gray togs.  Frank Scrivener, number two man in 1947, will step up to the top post this year.  Scrivener, a left-handed swinger, had an excellent record against collegiate competition, and [Coach] Colimore is counting heavily on a repeat performance. "

After college, Dad went into the asphalt business and developed a speciality in (surprise!) building tennis courts, including one in our backyard.  He also (to Mom's dismay)  built and ran an indoor racquet club (Severn Valley) so he could play all year round.  

For the next 40 years or so, the local papers were full of stories of Dad's triumphs in the tennis world, city and state championships galore. 

 As a senior player (55+), he was nationally-ranked along with his doubles partner, Warren Drake.  Scrivener and Drake were local legends, as this story from 1980 indicates.  This is probably my favorite story ever about my Dad. 

St. Tim's oldtimers foil younger foes By Mike Klingaman. (Evening Sun. Baltimore MD 18 July 1980.)

You knew Wednesday was the hottest day of the year when tennis players in the St. Timothy's Invitational showed up with two extra shirts, stayed under cover until the last minute and treated the gleaming chain link fence surrounding the courts like barbed wire. 

The place was barely livable, much less playable, and there stood a pair of portly geezers, Warren Drake (59) and Frank Scrivener (55), ready to hit the courts against two guys 30 years their junior. 

But hot as it was, Drake was just getting warmed up. It was, he decided, time for a story.

 "I remember playing doubles with Frank when it was so hot that I kept going around in his shadow, trying to stay out of the sun," said Drake. "I'd stand behind him and hit the ball, and the only reason we won was because the other team didn't know where the shots were coming from." 

He turned, winked at Scrivener, they trudged out and won their match in straight sets. That's the rule, not the exception with this well-matched pair, who have spent much of the past 10 years wiping smirks off the faces of younger tournament studs who anticipate easy wins.

 "There's always a pattern to it," said Drake. "First, they get that 'We've-got-a-couple-of-pigeons' look. Then, about the fourth game when we cross over, you hear them say something like, 'We gotta do something different." 

Like respecting their elders?

 "I think I get more of a kick out of outmaneuvering them than anything else," said Scrivener. "Besides, they usually beat themselves." 

The veterans' strategy is simple and realistic: play the net, place smart shots and run only when necessary. Nonetheless, they lost a quarterfinal match yesterday, 6-4, 6-2 to Art Berg and Lee Gaines.

 "I remember when Art's partner was a guy named Randy Sinclair, and we'd beat them all the time," said Drake. "Then Randy went away to college, came back and they beat us for the first time. You'd have thought he'd won Wimbledon." 

They are more than local legends. Scrivener, an alumnus of Calvert Hall and Loyola College, was ranked 10th nationally among 45-year-olds just three years ago. Drake, a retired army officer (lieutenant colonel) out of Alabama, was National Grass Courts 55 champion three- years ago.

Together, they have won the Maryland State 35, 45 and 55 doubles titles,- -the latter coming two weeks ago in Annapolis. Drake's credentials with other partners also includes the National Clay Court crown and the Canadian 55 championship. Both reside in Anne Arundel County, Drake in Glen Burnie and Scrivener, in Millersville, where he owns a construction company and also, until recently, the Severn Valley Tennis Club. 

Tennis prowess aside, they're an affable, loveable pair with a penchant for Globetrotter-like antics on the court: Drake, who is to local tennis what Minnesota Fats is to pool, has been, known to hit between his legs and behind his back. Wednesday, he once served underhanded. 

It's not for show, he said. 

"Usually, you wind up getting that point when they try to figure out what you hit, and how," said Drake. 

Sometimes, they almost seem to enjoy mimicking Laurel and Hardy, except that both of them look like Hardy. 

"I figure I'm smarter than him (Scrivener), because I picked him as a partner, and he only picked me," said Drake. 

"He (Drake) keeps you on your toes," said Scrivener. "He hit me in the nose with the ball about six weeks ago. I really didn't think I'd been playing that badly."

Drake and Scrivener receiving their trophies

With grandpa's encouragement, his grandsons Matt and James did give the game a try. Can't say they ever reached grandpa's skill level, though. 

Although several of my siblings played tennis, none developed that talent to the extent that Dad did. The athletic gene did seem to get passed down, though, as the younger generations boast many lacrosse players, soccer players, swimmers, gymnasts and other talented athletes.