The Penzance Open tournament was originally called the Penzance LTC Tournament as a combined

grass court A grass court is one of the four different types of tennis court on which the sport of tennis, originally known as "lawn tennis", is played. Grass courts are made of grasses in different compositions depending on the tournament. Although grass ...

tennis tournament staged at by the Penzance LTC,

Penzance Penzance ( ; kw, Pennsans) is a town, civil parish and port in the Penwith district of Cornwall, United Kingdom. It is the most westerly major town in Cornwall and is about west-southwest of Plymouth and west-southwest of London. Situ ...

Cornwall Cornwall (; kw, Kernow ) is a historic county and ceremonial county in South West England. It is recognised as one of the Celtic nations, and is the homeland of the Cornish people. Cornwall is bordered to the north and west by the Atlan ...

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 ...

in 1881, that ran until 1887. In 1950 the Penzance Open was established as a senior international tour level event that ran until 1978. The Penzance Open is still being staged today as a local tournament.

History

On 15 August 1881 the Penzance LTC Tournament was held for the first time at Penzance, Cornwall, England as a tennis event for men only that ended on 16 August. The first edition was won by a Mr. P. H. Fernandez. On 11 August 1882 the second edition of the tournament was concluded, the men's singles event was won by Arthur Stanhope Rashleigh, and the women's singles was won by a Miss M. Jackson. The first Penzance LTC Tournament was staged up to 1887, when both the club and event ended the with men's event being won by the American player A. K. Andrews. In the summer of 1950 saw the first Penzance Open Tournament was staged by the new Penzance Lawn Tennis Club at Penlee Park, Penzance, Cornwall. Former winners of the men's singles title include; the Polish player

Ernest Whittmann Ernest is a given name derived from Germanic word ''ernst'', meaning "serious". Notable people and fictional characters with the name include: People *Archduke Ernest of Austria (1553–1595), son of Maximilian II, Holy Roman Emperor *Ernest, M ...

(1953–1954), Roger Taylor (1959), The women's singles title has been won by

Joan Curry Patricia Joan Curry Hughesman (December 1918 – August 2020) was a British squash and tennis player who won the British Open Squash Championships three times in a row from 1947 to 1949. Her toughest victory was in 1948, when she beat the 10-ti ...

(1955), Billie Woodgate (1957–1958), a Wimbledon quarter finalist in the women's doubles, and

mixed doubles Mixed doubles or mixed pairs is a form of mixed-sex sports that consists of teams of one man and one woman. This variation of competition is prominent in curling and racket sports, such as tennis, table tennis and badminton (where it is known as ...

events.

Venue

In 1947 a new Penzance Lawn Tennis Club was established at the promenade,

and consisted of 2 hard courts. In 1950 Penzance LTC moved to a permanent location at Penlee Park. The club then consisted of 4 ‘En Tout Cas’ shale courts, plus 2 existing grass courts. Today the club has 4 floodlit artificial grass courts and 3 floodlit macadam hard courts.

References

{{Reflist, 2

Sources

* Penzance 71st Open Tournament 2021". tennis-cornwall.co.uk. Tennis Cornwall. * Penzance Tennis Club. "Our History". penzancetennisclub.co.uk. * Player Profile: Ernest Wittmann". ATP Tour. ATP. * Player Profile: Billie Woodgate". www.wimbledon.com. LTA. * Routledges Sporting Annual. (1882). Lawn Tennis in 1881. George Routledge and Sons. * Routledge's Sporting Annual. (1883). London: George Routledge and Sons. Defunct tennis tournaments in the United Kingdom Grass court tennis tournaments