Allison "Al" Danzig (February 27, 1898 – January, 27 1987) was an American

sportswriter Sports journalism is a form of writing that reports on matters pertaining to sporting topics and competitions. Sports journalism started in the early 1800s when it was targeted to the social elite and transitioned into an integral part of the n ...

who specialized in writing about

tennis Tennis is a racket sport that is played either individually against a single opponent ( singles) or between two teams of two players each ( doubles). Each player uses a tennis racket that is strung with cord to strike a hollow rubber ball ...

, but also covered college football,

squash Squash may refer to: Sports * Squash (sport), the high-speed racquet sport also known as squash racquets * Squash (professional wrestling), an extremely one-sided match in professional wrestling * Squash tennis, a game similar to squash but pla ...

, many

Olympic Games The modern Olympic Games or Olympics (french: link=no, Jeux olympiques) are the leading international sporting events featuring summer and winter sports competitions in which thousands of athletes from around the world participate in a vari ...

, and

rowing Rowing is the act of propelling a human-powered watercraft using the sweeping motions of oars to displace water and generate reactional propulsion. Rowing is functionally similar to paddling, but rowing requires oars to be mechanically ...

. Danzig was the only American sportswriter to extensively cover real tennis, the precursor to modern

lawn tennis Tennis is a racket sport that is played either individually against a single opponent (singles) or between two teams of two players each (doubles). Each player uses a tennis racket that is strung with cord to strike a hollow rubber ball cove ...

. Danzig covered every tournament in the Grand Slam - the U.S. Open, the Australian Open, Wimbledon, and the French Open - as well as many others. In 1968, Danzig was inducted into the

International Tennis Hall of Fame The International Tennis Hall of Fame is located in Newport, Rhode Island, United States. It honors both players and other contributors to the sport of tennis. The complex, the former Newport Casino, includes a museum, grass tennis courts, an indo ...

Newport, Rhode Island Newport is an American seaside city on Aquidneck Island in Newport County, Rhode Island. It is located in Narragansett Bay, approximately southeast of Providence, south of Fall River, Massachusetts, south of Boston, and northeast of New Yor ...

, becoming the first

journalist A journalist is an individual that collects/gathers information in form of text, audio, or pictures, processes them into a news-worthy form, and disseminates it to the public. The act or process mainly done by the journalist is called journalis ...

in the Hall. In an interview shortly before his death, he named

Bill Tilden William Tatem Tilden II (February 10, 1893 – June 5, 1953), nicknamed "Big Bill", was an American tennis player. Tilden was the world No. 1 amateur for six consecutive years, from 1920 to 1925, and was ranked as the world No. 1 professional b ...

as the greatest player he had covered.

Biography

Danzig was born in 1898 in

Waco, Texas Waco ( ) is the county seat of McLennan County, Texas, United States. It is situated along the Brazos River and I-35, halfway between Dallas and Austin. The city had a 2020 population of 138,486, making it the 22nd-most populous city in the st ...

, but grew up in

Albany, New York Albany ( ) is the capital of the U.S. state of New York, also the seat and largest city of Albany County. Albany is on the west bank of the Hudson River, about south of its confluence with the Mohawk River, and about north of New York C ...

. His sister,

Evelyn Danzig Evelyn Danzig Levine (January 16, 1902 – July 26, 1996) was an American Tin Pan Alley songwriter, who was a one hit wonder best known for co-writing the music for the folk style ballad popular song " Scarlet Ribbons", published in 1949, with lyr ...

, wrote the music for the hit song "Scarlet Ribbons" in 1949. He graduated in 1921 from

Cornell University Cornell University is a private statutory land-grant research university based in Ithaca, New York. It is a member of the Ivy League. Founded in 1865 by Ezra Cornell and Andrew Dickson White, Cornell was founded with the intention to tea ...

, where he was co-editor of ''The Daily Sun'' with E.B. White. Danzig also briefly played football at Cornell while weighing just 125-pounds. He joined ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...

'' in 1923, after a stint at the '' Brooklyn Eagle'', and remained there until his retirement in 1968. Before becoming a sportswriter, Danzig wrote

obituaries An obituary (obit for short) is an article about a recently deceased person. Newspapers often publish obituaries as news articles. Although obituaries tend to focus on positive aspects of the subject's life, this is not always the case. Acc ...

, and was originally planning for a career as a foreign correspondent. Danzig wrote several books, including: ''The Racquet Game'' ( Macmillan 1930), a history of racquet sports; ''The Fireside Book of Tennis'' (

Simon & Schuster Simon & Schuster () is an American publishing company and a subsidiary of Paramount Global. It was founded in New York City on January 2, 1924 by Richard L. Simon and M. Lincoln Schuster. As of 2016, Simon & Schuster was the third largest pu ...

1972); and ''Oh, How They Played The Game'' (Macmillan 1971), about the early days of

American football American football (referred to simply as football in the United States and Canada), also known as gridiron, is a team sport played by two teams of eleven players on a rectangular field with goalposts at each end. The offense, the team wi ...

. A critic at ''The New York Times'' called his book ''History of American Football: Its Great Teams, Players and Coaches'' (1956) "without doubt, the most ambitious and best book ever published on the subject of college football." His last book, ''The Winning Gallery'', was a collection of articles and essays about real tennis, published by the

United States Court Tennis Association The United States Court Tennis Association is the governing body for the sport of real tennis in the United States. The first association president, William L. Van Alen, convened its initial meeting on January 30, 1955, at New York City's Racque ...

(USCTA).Allison Danzig, ''The Winning Gallery'' (USCTA 1987) He is credited with coining the term "ace" to describe a serve in which the opposing player fails to get their racket on the ball. He lived most of his adult life in

Roslyn, New York Roslyn ( ) is a village in the Town of North Hempstead in Nassau County, on the North Shore of Long Island, in New York, United States. It is the Greater Roslyn area's anchor community. The population was 2,770 at the 2010 census. History Ros ...

, with his wife, two daughters, and one son. He retired to

New Jersey New Jersey is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Northeastern regions of the United States. It is bordered on the north and east by the state of New York; on the east, southeast, and south by the Atlantic Ocean; on the west by the Delaware ...

, where he died on January 27, 1987.

References

External links

SquashTalkInternational Tennis Hall of Fame
{{DEFAULTSORT:Danzig, Allison 1898 births 1987 deaths American sports journalists International Tennis Hall of Fame inductees Tennis writers People from Roslyn, New York The New York Times people Cornell Big Red football players