Ponce de Leon might have been a few hundred years too early in his quest for the elusive fountain of youth. Two Columbus men may have trumped the Spanish explorer, discovering a secret or two of their own to long-lasting vitality — on courts where the crisp thwack of a tennis ball is a much sweeter sound than the creak of any rocking chair.
Jake Propst and J.V. Carr are 89 and 84, respectively, and neither one talks of hanging up his racket any time soon. While team sports like basketball, football and soccer often must be left behind as generations age, these two octogenarians prove tennis can be a lifelong friend.
On Monday, Propst and Carr — or Jake and Coach, as they are popularly hailed — shared a few memories of tennis” past in the Friendly City, and of their enjoyment of a sport that keeps them coming back for more.
Taking up the racquet
Jake, born in Columbus in 1920, was a letterman in five sports at Stephen D. Lee High School. A baseball stand-out, he attended college on a scholarship and even played semi-pro ball with various teams.
“I played other sports, tennis was just one of ”em,” said the Ole Miss Athletic Hall of Famer, relaxed at a table in the clubhouse of Magnolia Tennis Club. Coach, a former athletics coach and Lee High principal, sits nearby. Both are dressed in workmanlike tennis togs. Both are club charter members, among the “First 25” — those dedicated core stockholders who each put up $1,000 in the early 1960s to meet the challenge of providing the sport a permanent home locally.
“I started out playing when I was pretty young,” recalls Jake. “My uncle built a tennis court on the South side, and everybody from the neighborhood came. We didn”t have any instruction, we just played.”
Coach picked up the game at a later age.
“I really didn”t start playing until I was in my 30s, in the 1960s,” he said. “A group played on Wednesdays on privately-owned courts down by Seminole Manufacturing.” Coach joined them the first time at the invitation of then-school superintendent James Goolsby. A few of the other Wednesday regulars included Kirk Egger, Oscar Burris, Sterling Chandler, Birney Imes Jr. … and Jake Propst.
New purpose
When the avid tennis players learned a potential land sale would probably mean the loss of the courts they played on, a plan was devised to establish a non-profit tennis club to provide a permanent home and help grow the sport locally.
Dues were just $5 a year, the men recall. “Just enough to buy the stuff to keep it up.”
Volunteer hours and elbow grease were common.
“The club used to be a real volunteer thing,” said Jake, a 1995 inductee into the Mississippi Tennis Hall of Fame. “Members put down the rubber coat … and everybody had sore knees after putting down the lines,” he smiled, referring to the original four courts constructed at the Magnolia Lane site. Jake and Coach particularly recalled the late Bobby Jones as they reminisced. “He was down here all the time; he loved this club,” they agreed.
“We scrounged a lot of whatever we got,” Propst noted. The metal steps leading to the second floor of the clubhouse, for example, came from the former Doster Hospital in downtown Columbus.
The tennis club now boasts 12 courts (four hard courts, eight soft courts) and has 116 members.
The times, how they have changed
Of course, in the almost five decades since the local tennis club was established, changes have been plenty.
There was a time when the courts were filled primarily with men. Carmen Montgomery of Columbus, a past Magnolia board member and a current board member of the Mississippi Tennis Association, remembers, “Women would usually play in the day time, and the men mostly had the courts after work and in the evenings.”
“And everyone used to wear all white,” Jake added.
“I think the biggest change has been in racket technology,” stated Coach. “When I first started playing, I played with a wooden racket.”
For Montgomery, like most of the regional tennis community, the two veteran players are walking testaments to the health benefits of regular tennis play. Numerous medical studies document increased heart health, improved balance, agility, fitness and strength, for starters.
And it”s good for the psyche, too.
“Tennis is a social exercise,” Montgomery noted. Contact and social interaction are all part of the game”s draw.
“It”s good exercise; it keeps you in shape; and you can usually find somebody to play with on your level. If you”re always losing six-love, six-love, you”ll lose interest,” said Coach Carr, encouraging players to partner with a variety of others at different skill levels.
Montgomery added that Carr has always been a good sparring partner, encouraging anybody trying to improve their game. “Even when my daughter, Marian, was a little girl and just starting, he would willingly hit the ball with her.”
Just do it
According to the United States Tennis Association and 2009 Sports and Fitness Participation Report, participation in tennis has grown substantially more than any other traditional sport from 2000-2008 — up 43 percent. (The next closest sport was racquetball, with an 11.6 percent increase.)
The Mississippi Tennis Association offers programs for not only adults, but junior tennis teams for players 8-18, and even younger children, ages 4-8. Although there is currently no local program, MTA”s wheelchair tennis is another aspect growing in popularity.
“This is a sport that is affordable,” said Jake. “You just need a tennis racket. And all family members can get involved.”
Montgomery concurred. “All you really need is a love of the game and good sportsmanship to get started.”
Fortunately, for most, it”s also a sport in which practice and persistence begin to pay off quickly. Jake has never forgotten this bit of advice for improvement he once got from a strong player he admired: “You”ve just got to hit a million tennis balls.”
As Propst and Carr discovered decades ago, tennis can be the sport of a lifetime, the catalyst for remaining youthfully active and healthy.
The knees and other joints will eventually protest, and the serve may lose some zip — but the secret to fun and success never really varies much, no matter the age category:
“Just hit ”em where they ain”t,” grinned Jake. “With a little somethin” on it.”
Jan Swoope is the Lifestyles Editor for The Commercial Dispatch.
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