The Drive Club Open Tournament and informally known as the Fulham Hard Courts was a combined men's and women's tennis tournament played at the Drive Club, Fulham, London, originally on hard cement courts, or sometimes clay courts and ran until 1928. In 1931 the Drive Club was closed.

History

The Drive Club Tournament was founded in 1908 and were played on the Drive Mansions tennis courts at

Fulham Fulham () is an area of the London Borough of Hammersmith & Fulham in West London, England, southwest of Charing Cross. It lies on the north bank of the River Thames, bordering Hammersmith, Kensington and Chelsea. The area faces Wandsworth ...

London London is the capital and largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary down to the North Sea, and has been a majo ...

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...

. They consisted of cement (concrete) courts, the first hard courts in London. The drive club also had clay courts constructed that had to resurfaced in 1926 with

en tout cas A clay court is one of the types of tennis court on which the sport of tennis, originally known as "lawn tennis", is played. Clay courts are made of crushed stone, brick, shale, or other unbound mineral aggregate depending on the tournament. T ...

red clay. In 1931 the drive club closed over the years the courts and grounds were not maintained, and eventually became abandoned. The land was sold to developers in the 1970s.Drive Mansions Notable winners of the men's singles championship title included Charles Percy Dixon (1908-1910) and

Gordon Lowe Sir Francis Gordon Lowe, 2nd Baronet (21 June 1884 – 17 May 1972) was a British male tennis player. Lowe is best remembered for winning the Australasian Championships in 1915 (where he beat champion Horace Rice in the final). and for winni ...

(1920-1922). Former women's singles winners included Dorothy Holman, (1912, 1920, 1922–1923), Geraldine Ramsey Beamish (1924-1925), Kitty McKane (1924),

Phyllis Howkins Covell Phyllis Lindrea Covell ( Howkins. 22 May 1895 – 28 October 1982) was a female tennis player from Great Britain. She is best remembered for her silver medal at the Paris Olympics of 1924 in the women's doubles event partnering with Kitty McKan ...

(1925) and

Phyllis Mudford Phyllis Mudford King (23 August 1905 – 27 January 2006) was an English female tennis player and the oldest living Wimbledon champion when she died at age 100. Phyllis Evelyn Mudford was born in 1905 in Wallington, Surrey. She was educated at ...

(1928). Additionally

Molla Bjurstedt Anna Margrethe "Molla" Bjurstedt Mallory (née Bjurstedt; 6 March 1884 – 22 November 1959) was a Norwegian tennis player, naturalized American. She won a record eight singles titles at the U.S. National Championships. She was the first woman ...

was a losing finalist in 1909.

References

{{Reflist, 2

Sources

* Fry, Charles Burgess (1910). "Lawn Tennis on Hard Courts". Fry's Magazine: The Illustrated Monthly of Sport, Travel and Outdoor Life. London: G. Newnes, Limited. * "History: The early days". drivemansions.co.uk. London, England. The Drive Mansions Ltd. * The Municipal Journal and Public Works Engineer (1926), En Tout Cas: Hard Lawn Tennis Court. London. Volume 35, Issue 1749. p. 1282 * The Sportsman (25 September 1912). The Drive Club Open Tournament at Fulham. London, England. Defunct tennis tournaments in the United Kingdom Clay court tennis tournaments Hard court tennis tournaments