On the 5 July, 1879, the American tennis player and Republican politician, Dwight Filley Davis, Sr. [1879 –1945] was born in St. Louis, Missouri.
He served as the US Assistant Secretary of War from 1923 to 1925 and the 49th Secretary of War from 1925 to 1929, but is best remembered as the founder of the international tennis competition the Davis Cup.
Davis reached the All-Comers final for the Men’s Singles title at the US Championships in 1898 and 1899. Davis then teamed up with Holcombe Ward, and won the pair won the Men’s Doubles title at the Championships for three years in a row from 1899 to 1901. While still a student at Harvard College, Davis also won the American intercollegiate singles championship of 1899. The formidable pairing of Davis and Ward were also the runners-up in the Men’s Doubles final at Wimbledon in 1901.
In 1900 Davis designed and developed the structure for a new international tennis competition known as the International Lawn Tennis Challenge. He donated a silver bowl to be presented to the winner , which was later renamed the Davis Cup in his honour. He was a member of the US team that won the first two competitions in 1900 and 1902 , and was the US captain of the 1900 team.
On the 5 July, 1904, Britain defeated Belgium 5-0 at Wimbledon to win the International Lawn Tennis Challenge, later to become the international tennis tournament the Davis Cup, which is fiercely competed to this day. In that same year Davis represented the USA in the 1904 Summer Olympics in his home town of St. Louis, Missouri, where he was eliminated in the second round of the singles tournament.
Dwight F. Davis died in Washington DC in 1945 aged 66.
5 July, 2019