Prophet of Boom
There are over 35 million tennis players in the United States but there are few with the devotion of John F. Anderson '34. A selfprofessed "prophet of boom," Anderson has been president of the University School Tennis Club in Chagrin Falls, Ohio, for 15 years and has been playing the game for decades longer than the Johnny-come-latelies who have been clogging the courts during tennis' recent explosion of popularity.
Yet Anderson, a past trustee of the Cleveland Area Board of Realtors, only claims tennis as a hobby. In fact, he's worried that many readers of the class notes "seem to have gotten the idea that all I do is run the Club." So, for the record, Anderson is also a successful realtor, a former newspaper columnist and a writer of fight songs. He tried writing a fight song for Dartmouth in his Tuck School days with the help of Harry Wellman 'O7 (who wrote Men of Dartmouth). It never caught on, but he did succeed with FightOn. Case Reserve.
The U.S. Tennis Club not only finances itself but, under Anderson's aegis, has resurfaced courts at one of the school's campuses and has made a generous gift toward new courts at the other campus. The 35-year-old club added indoor courts some four years ago.
Anderson, who couldn't resist setting up a tennis tournament for the 1971 Alumni College crew, plays in rain or shine - and he's not above sweeping off the courts when the blustery winds off Lake Erie deliver less than perfect tennis weather.
And Anderson never misses a chance to boost Dartmouth. He placed an advertisement in a Cleveland newspaper several years ago boasting about some property he was trying to sell: "THE BIG GREEN" is the nickname for a well-known college football team (Dartmouth). It also describes this beautiful wooded lot ..."
