Art Carrington: Black Tennis

0:00:00 Jack Broudy: Like I said, welcome to Living at the 45. I'm very honored today to be talking to a brother from the other side of the country, East Coast. And it's funny, and I use the word brother for different reasons than most people would think.

0:00:17 Jack Broudy: I don't know how art found it, because I first learned about you through the figure eight, which I've been obsessed with, which I've been obsessed with for about 30 years. I studied a guy named Rudolph Steiner. I don't know if you've heard of him. He's a big figure 8 guy. So

0:00:33 Jack Broudy: I studied him for years and went to a couple of Steiner colleges up in Northern California, Southern California. But anyway, that's why I feel like we are somewhat brethren in that respect. Plus, I think I told you, I played some ATA events back in the day. But let me introduce you again. It's Art Carrington. Like I said, it's a true honor. In my opinion, Art, you're a living legend. You are. My pleasure.

0:01:00 Jack Broudy: And I really, I got to tell you, I've been thinking about this discussion we're going to have quite a bit. I don't see how I can wrap it up in an hour, because I got more questions than just on this one topic. And I've got a few topics I'd like to discuss with you. So hopefully you'll have a good time.

0:01:20 Art Carrington: All right. So let's get you where you want to start. I want to start with ATA. And I must have been sleeping under a rock, because I just realized after reading your book, Black Tennis, which I have right here on my coffee table now,

0:01:37 Jack Broudy: and it'll never leave my coffee table. It's one of my favorites. I just pick it up all the time

0:01:42 Art Carrington: and just read a different, just a different article or just look at some pictures. And I love history anyway, but certainly tennis history is a big deal to me. So this is the book we're going to talk about. And it's like a history of the ATA really. And so that's where I'd like to stick with our focus today, Art, is just on the ATA itself, which is a huge, huge thing. And I'd like to, instead of asking the obvious questions, I kind of like to get in the nitty gritty of it just a little bit. So please say hello and introduce yourself to everyone. Hello everyone.

Art Carrington: This is Art Carrington speaking. I'm up here in Amherst, Massachusetts at Hampshire College, where we have an indoor complex called the Multisports Center with the Bay Road Tennis Club. We have four indoor courts, track, fitness center, and 10 outdoor courts and eight pickleball courts. So we have a complete facility up here. I've been at Hampshire College since 1980. I'm from New Jersey originally. My wife is from East Hampton, Massachusetts, and I started summer camp up here in 1980 at Hampshire College. I've been at Hampshire College since then. Okay. Okay. That's a big, that's a nice size facility. That's perfect. Yeah, you got a nice facility. Amherst College plays matches here and practices. University of Massachusetts plays matches and practices here. So, you know, we've got a pretty active facility. Now, wait a minute, Amherst, is that D3, right? Or D2? D3. D3. One of the top schools. And UMass is D1. You know, we have D1 schools coming in here playing matches against UMass. We have top D3 schools in the conference coming in playing in Amherst College. One of my boys that I coached, Warren Wood, he won the D3 in 2015, but the guy he beat was the guy from Amherst. That's why I kind of remember it. Okay. Okay. So Amherst is a pretty tough, that's a pretty tough school. Yeah, it's good. Very good academic school. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. And good tennis. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. They're always on the top of D3. And go ahead. Well, no, I was going to read a paragraph to you that will open this up. This is Time Magazine, weekly news magazine, August 28, 1939. Okay. It's called Jim Crow Tennis. Excuse the language because we're speaking in an old language, but I just want to read it in the language that is in. Negroes are not permitted to play major league baseball, are not tolerated in big time tournaments of the US Golf Association or the United States Lawn Tennis Association. They have their own American League and National League, their own all-star baseball game. They have their own national golf association, which puts on championship matches. But at no sport, are they more firmly organized than at tennis. Since 1916, United States Negroes have banded together in the American Tennis Association, which not only serves as the governing body of 150 Negro clubs and 25,000 players, but also gives up across Negro doctors, lawyers, teachers, and preachers a chance to shine socially. Now, the 1939 ATA Nationals took place a week before this article. And being a history man, I know that somebody, a writer in the Time organization, read in the black news media about what was going on in black America. And they saw that the ATA Nationals, they saw this article and the 1939 ATA Nationals at Hampton, Virginia, Jimmy McDaniel won. And it was a very famous national because it was at Hampton University, which was Hampton Institute at the time, and Buckwell Beach, Private Beach, and it was really something. And so this writer from Time wrote this article. Now, I just read the opening paragraph and the rest of it, I don't need to read any more. So where it says, but at no sport, was more organized than in tennis. Now that's where we start. People don't know this. They know Negro Baseball League, but they never thought about what do you think about the black elite, the black middle class? We didn't have a leisure class, so we didn't have anybody inherited money. So our upper class did not consist of, you know, inherited. So, but people don't know what did our leisure class, what did our educated, what did our private business people do? What did we do? So as early as 1898, we had our first inter-club tennis match in Pennsylvania at the, it was in Philadelphia, and it was at the Colored Williams Women's YMCA. And they called it the National Club, the National Championship, that's where for, you know, black clubs. And these clubs came from Boston to DC primarily, that's where the players came from. And that was the start. By 1915, when they had to start in 1898 with this annual club event, by 1915, they had the idea, let's start an organization that is a national organization to bring more black people in, to make more, but they call it college citizens, make the college citizens, everybody that was left out of the USTA, you know, segregation was a norm. So we're not going to be talking about segregation. No. I was the Jim Crow part of tennis. So in 1916, the American Tennis Association was founded as a corporation. And then in 1917, the first national championship was held. Now originally, the first nationals were always held where you had to really, it was like a who's who in black America event, you had to have a friend that you could stay at their house, there were no commercial facilities that we could, you know, really resorts or anything, hotels and whatnot, we didn't have that. And so you had some colored wives that could house people. But so the first ATA national tennis championships were, you know, like I said, a who's who event. By 1925, it went on to a a campus in New Jersey, we had a school called the New Jersey Training School, it was a school for black people called Bordentown, it was in Bordentown, New Jersey. Yeah, familiar. And at Bordentown, they decided to have the first national championship on campus. It was such an extravaganza that that's when it was decided that they would now take the black championships on to college campuses, black college campuses. And you would have 5000 people come because we had this clustered, you know what I mean, isolated environment on these black campuses. And that's, you know, that's where, and that event grew and grew and the American Tent Association developed clubs around the country, educated and that's where black tennis, that's how Arthur Ashe, Althea Gibson, myself and all us black tennis players got exposed to tennis in those days through this system that was put together with these clubs all over the country through the ATA.

0:09:23 Jack Broudy: Well, you know,

0:09:27 Jack Broudy: like I said, reading your book for the last six or seven days, I've been opening up a whole new can of worms, you know, I'm thinking, well, wait a minute, the sport began and I think 1847 in France, is that correct? I mean, that's what I always heard that tennis began in France. 1874. Oh, okay. I had it wrong. The incorporation of the game, I believe was about 1874. In Europe? Yeah, in England.

0:09:55 Jack Broudy: So you, so the ATA was developed right after?

0:09:58 Art Carrington: Well, Booker T. Washington, slavery, right after slavery in 1890 Booker T. Washington built the first tennis court at a black college in 1890. That was in 30 years after slavery was over. You know what I mean? So, that's where it began in black college at Tuskegee in the south and tennis in the north. Well, if you lived in the north, you had a lot more opportunity than you did in the south. So, tennis in the south for black people was primarily played at black colleges and on private courts in private yards or small private clubs. In the north, we had small private clubs as well as we could play in public parks. So on the cover of my book is a picture of Forest Park in Springfield, Massachusetts, where the basketball home famous, in 1925. Austin, you know, you could go down, you could play in public parks in New Jersey. Certain places you could play, you know, you didn't run into that segregation thing. So in the north you had primarily black Americans and you had Caribbean population. They came from Jamaica and Barbados and Trinidad and tennis was in their background, these English colonies you had the people with. So everywhere originally that white tennis existed, black tennis existed. Yeah, you're right. Which you're going to see in the book. So you see that Boston, Longwood. Boston was a hub for black tennis players. Then you go down to the Orange Lawn in Orange, New Jersey. Then we're in New Jersey tennis. You go to Chicago tennis, you had the Prairie View Club and you went to New Orleans. That's where tennis really grew. Boston, you know, along the east coast, Chicago and New Orleans is where tennis first grew in America. The French in New Orleans had the tennis park and then the east coast we had these grass court clubs and you know most tennis joined forces with cricket clubs and croquet clubs. Right. And so it started on lawns and these are the facilities that had lawns. Now my personal case, coming from Elizabeth, New Jersey, I lived right on the water across the water in New York, Staten Island. Now this American lady was supposed to have had the tennis come into Staten Island. That's one of the two places they say tennis first came. So it came into New Jersey really quick and in Elizabeth, New Jersey, the Elizabeth County Country Club at the time was one of the founding members in 1881 of the USTA, USLTA. USLTA, that's right.

0:12:54 Art Carrington: In New England, I played New England tennis, it was the NELTA. Right. So in my neighborhood we had a black-owned tennis club but it was the backyard of a white doctor that had a double lot. The only house in the area that had a double lot. And at the back of that double lot started a black neighborhood. The white doctor had built two tennis courts in his yard, so I'm talking about 1900, 1910. He let the blacks in the neighborhood play because it was like I said it was this double lot that backed up to their neighborhood. So he allowed them to play and eventually in like 1920 he deeded it and sold the tennis courts to black people for a tennis club and then sold his home because the area was becoming more commercial. And so that's how I got to have these tennis courts. It was only two, these were two courts owned by the black club and then there was a Lisbetown and Country Club which was like an eighth of a mile away from me that I never saw, went in or had anything to do with it. And I'm glad that I never did because I never felt like I was left out of anything. I thought that tennis was a black game, a black club, out the Egyptian, all kind of people coming through there, and she was number one in the world, and I never saw any other tennis. So I thought tennis was a black, that was a black name is what I thought you know what I mean. And so it wasn't until I got ventured out I had game, I started going to play in local tournaments and so I played USTA, I played in my early start I played ATA, that was my start, and then I played because of the early 60s, late 50s, I played USTA events, you know local park tournaments, and so you know we spoke before about this Jewish thing right? And so Phil Grayson, Jeff Miller, Steve Siegel, my boys, they befriended me and they would invite me to their clubs and to their houses and whatnot and so my whole world just opened up. That's when I realized tennis wasn't just a black game but I did realize that it was a game that could move you, that socially. And so I saw that people always invited me, they saw me play, next you know the parents tell me invite them to the club, invite them to the house, invite them here, invite them there, and my world just opened up more and more. Oh yeah. Well tennis is a funny sport you know tennis and golf if you're good and you look good both, I think both are important, have good strokes, have good strokes. You know people really overestimate you and I've always, it's always worked in my favor, you know I think all us tennis players. Yeah. You just said something powerful because you said if you look good. Now people would see me play and say my father was a doctor. Just as all the whites would say you know this father's a doctor. And my father was a construction laborer. You understand he was a trained brick mason but he wasn't, they didn't allow blacks in the union at the time so my father was in the construction labor union, very strong person in that union but they made me the son of a doctor just based on my stroke production. What you talking about? That's right. That's right. That's what my game looked. Yeah I think the word elite comes in when someone sees you look beautiful, they don't care where you're from, they've already made their opinion about you like oh you're a beautiful person, you're a bright, you're a bright intelligent person. Anyone who plays tennis like that, must be, must be.

0:16:33 Jack Broudy: You're so on point man, you see it. Yeah. Yeah that's really interesting. You know it's funny you mentioned Jamaican. I brought up another, I played with a guy in the boys tennis 16s. I wonder if you know him. I

0:16:47 Jack Broudy: never would have remembered his name but I can't believe I just did. Early, early early Jones.

0:16:52 Jack Broudy: Early Jones, I know early. Yeah. Yeah so I played with him and then I played with Weldon. I told you about Weldon Rogers. By the way I found out he lives in, I looked him up, took a while, Tucker Georgia. That's where he lives and he's still, he's teaching tennis down there. He must be about 70 but I looked him up and he's still around. I'm glad to see. I hope he sees this production.

0:17:16 Jack Broudy: Let's track his number. I'll have somebody tracking him down for us. We'll get this number.

0:17:21 Art Carrington: Yeah.

0:17:23 Jack Broudy: Let me ask you some more. So I kind of felt bad in a way because I researched quite a bit. Like I said you and I both found, talked about the eight before anyone else. I don't even know if anyone else still talks about her other than, I only see yours in my post.

0:17:39 Art Carrington: No one else talks about it but you wrote your book, you copywrote, you wrote your book in 2009. Right.

0:17:49 Jack Broudy: I couldn't believe, I thought you just,

0:17:50 Art Carrington: I thought you published it about a year ago and I feel terrible that I didn't know about it. The whole movement just caught on fire and you know this whole Black Lives Matter and just yeah you know looking into it you know the history, the history doesn't change so that's one of those things where that history doesn't change and yeah I'm glad you became aware of it. I am too.

0:18:14 Jack Broudy: I became aware of you at least, it had to be 25. How long you been doing that eight board?

0:18:20 Art Carrington: About 25 years. As soon as that came out Glenn Brooks turned me on to you. Oh yeah. Remember Glenn Brooks? He was a radio

0:18:28 Jack Broudy: guy. Yeah

0:18:29 Art Carrington: I remember the name. I wonder how it is. I know. He was a radio guy and he did a lot with tennis and he had done an exhibition with D-Lost, maybe mentioned if he up in Vermont with Brody Miller and but anyway he's the one that opened me up to you in the eight board. Yeah that's right the eight board. Yeah I was doing my thing and he was like okay do you know who this person is and so I didn't and that's, but then we called you.

0:18:59 Art Carrington: That's funny that's a long time

0:19:00 Jack Broudy: yeah that's when it first came out about 1998 I think.

0:19:04 Art Carrington: It tells me I got a good memory so you know like that's what I do.

0:19:09 Jack Broudy: Hey you know one of the questions I had for you, I can't help myself but how'd you get all this stuff?

0:19:14 Jack Broudy: Did you go to the library? Is your mom, did your mom give you all these articles? How did you find all these articles in this book?

0:19:21 Art Carrington: First of all all my life people would ask me how did I get, you know who are you? They see you bling it. How did you, you know I go to a tournament wherever, how did you get started in tennis? How did you, you know what I mean?

And so once I came out of Hampton I wanted, I was very proud of where I came from. I was proud of my roots. I was proud of the ATA. I was proud of my mentors and so and opportunities that I had and I was almost very arrogant about when you'd ask me like it was beyond you know like what do you think Black America was doing? You know what I mean?

0:20:00 Art Carrington: And so when I moved to Massachusetts permanently because I've been coming up here since 1965 because I met my wife at Hampton but once I moved up here in 1980 I saw that you could have a library card at Amherst College, UMass, Mount Holyoke, Smith College. I'm like you know all the schools yeah.

I have a free card to colleges that cost $75,000. I couldn't believe it so I got all the library cards I could get right. In the winter I would go down in the archives and get the microfiche and the micro there was no table of contents there was nothing that existed. This was but I'm talking about in 1990 and in the 80s and I'd go in and I didn't know how to present it and everybody was trying to you know like you got to reproduce you know then all of a sudden I realized I got to do this just like my rappers just like it's basement rap man. I got to bring this out of the archives and show it just the way it is because people need to see where tennis was in our society at one point. When you look at and those articles in the book when I first started showing the history I reenacted all of the complete pages that the article was in so you it and then I did exhibits. I called it royalty of the colored court and that's what my exhibit was about black America and caribbeans and all of the non-white that participated in development. I called them royalty the colored courts. This is what Arthur Ashen, Althea and us came from. We came from these black doctors. We came from these educated these successful people that created this opportunity for us and this is what I didn't like about whenever we whenever we take one person and focus on they don't know that Arthur Ashen came from a community that built him. They don't know that he's built Althea. They built me because they felt obligated and they this was taught by our mentors that you're supposed to help. So they created these little clubs all over and and then the communities around those clubs had opportunities and so like uh Kinkle Jones Eugene Kinkle Jones founder of the Alpha Greek organization which is big with black he was you know a early member of the American Ten Association one of the founding members he graduated from Cornell in like 1906 and so uh Talley Holmes who was the first black to play in Wimbledon in 1924 came to America from Jamaica to win the ATA championship in 1920. So um I had to be you know people always hear the oral story but I wanted them to see it. So that's why they would always say you need to tell your story. I'm like no this is not about my story. That's what they always do. I want you to see where tennis was in our society at one point and how and when you see the newspaper articles you got to see newspaper articles before NBA basketball was big before blacks were big in basketball. You're amazed that the collection the collection of articles when you see that I took so I couldn't put a whole big article in the book so I took the tennis article out of these pages but if you see the whole page then you see just you would see where my parents always told me that they would go to the Negro Baseball League All-Star Games at Yankee Stadium 40,000 people. See I grew up hearing about all this kind of thing you know people don't understand so when you think about the Negro Baseball Leagues and when you think about how all those players got put into the professional leagues but nobody thinks about the owners of the Negro teams that lost all those players for no money. Nobody paid them. They just came and took everybody. And so you know like the whole economy the whole it was economies there was a lot that went around this whole tennis world like in New York where Althea was at the Cosmopolitan Club. What do you think but the most well-off blacks would come in and out of the Cosmopolitan Club. You had the Savoy Ballroom which was the number one ballroom in the world. You had Sugar Ray Robinson. You had Billy Eckstein and Joe Lewis and you know all of the famous black people Billy Holland did so they all mingled at these same places at these black oasis where you had these successful people. And if you could get a glimpse of them then America looked like a different America to you. You saw some different stuff so fortunately I'm from New Jersey so I grew up going to New York. I grew up going to the Apollo Theater and the Brooklyn Fox Theater and you know so I've seen both sides. I've had tremendous mentors on both sides. Black, white, Jewish, like I tell you Dick Sabat played a big part in my development and a lot of other people. So

0:24:52 Art Carrington: you know Well people don't know that there's a connection between Jews and blacks. I mean people just don't know that.

No we came from the same neighborhoods in New Jersey. That's right. That's right. When I got into college the third club in the state of New Jersey was built called the Westfield indoor tennis club right. It was a Jewish family that was from Elizabeth, New Jersey. Then now they lived out in the suburbs. Man it was so happy to take me in and make me the first pro at 22 years old man. Off the ash used to call me up there, come on down to Doral. I want you to run to Doral for me. I'm like no man I'm not, you know when he first got the position as the head of Doral first he used to call me up. He was playing a tournament in I think it was in Charlotte, North Carolina. And so he called me like yo I want you to go down and run. But anyway this family I had it so good. And when I used to tell DeBurnson, the son of the people that owned the club, but he was a lawyer like 20 years older than me. When I tell you want to go to a party with me tonight, him and his wife and my wife and I, I take New York to off the ash department, Rob Lever, Jack Kramer, you see everybody in the world at the party. I was like holy cow. So anyway. No, no I hear you. I hear you. I think it's a shame that even pros forget the students, forget the kids. Kids don't even know who Agassi is. I think it's a shame that the pros and the kids today don't know the rich history of tennis and black tennis and color. Like you say, people of color because it wasn't just blacks, right? There was a lot of-We had Filipinos in ATA, Filipinos, we had South Americans, we had-Some good Mexican players? And we had Willie Oropes, Guillermo Villas. I don't know whether you know him, he's from New York. Played in New York, he's a good player. So anyway. Yeah. No I think it's important but I don't even think the tennis pros themselves know about this stuff really, not the ones that I've talked to. Most people, listen, the head of the Wimbledon Museum and Library sent me a letter. One of his friends sent him the book and he said, he's so embarrassed he never heard of ATA but he heard of Althea and Arthur but he never heard of that. And he's the, here's the man that's the head of Wimbledon. So you know when you talk about hidden figures you couldn't go any further than tennis. You wouldn't even think that we had 150 clubs in 1939 in the country or 25,000 tennis players. Would you think like that? No. No and I would not even think like I said, and I keep going back to this, tennis was just invented and you guys were playing. I mean that's-Because our educated class, our success class mirrored the white American middle class. So it's not poor white kids that play tennis, right? In fact I was just going to address that, that was my next thing is talking about the elite because I know in the white players when I was growing up we were one of the poorest. My dad was just a CPA, that was it, but there were a lot of doctors and lawyers, sons that played the game. I couldn't stand half the kids, they were cocky and conceited and I didn't like them much. And it sounds like in the black tennis it was very similar, it sounds like the highest echelon of people

who were playing tennis. I got black friends whose parents would, they had their ancestry goes into the 1800s with physicians, you know what I mean? And so right on down the line. And so still doctors and whatnot. It's Ashe and Althea and myself that became the players and you understand a lot of we went to college and whatnot but the doctors, you know we had a whole society that they repeated being doctors but these people wanted to be represented at Forest Hills and in mainstream tennis. So that's how they created junior development programs for us and you know there's all kinds of programs, that's what the ATA provided for us. Back in those days man you know we used to say when we're going to a USTA tournament, you know we say we're going to a white tournament. That's how you distinguish when going to a white tournament. That meant we're going to the USTA. If you just say white tournament you know you're going to the ATA. You know I remember playing my first ATA tournament, it was in Stanford, Stanford Connecticut if you remember that place, Stanford Park? Yeah. Scousy Park I think it was called. Yeah Scousy Park in Stanford Connecticut and that's where they had the, in September they would have the ATA New England doubles, the New England Open.

0:29:27 Jack Broudy: That's right, we played, Weldon and I played that tennis tournamnet.

0:29:30 Art Carrington: Yeah. But most people in the sense were very social as well as tennis. I was just going to say that. I felt you know talk about you know today's election day so I think it's kind of fitting that you and I are talking today. I don't know why I just think it's fitting but it was very inclusive ATA. I was like literally maybe I think there was one other white guy there other than me and then there was a lot of blacks and a lot of Hispanics but I had a great time and we did pretty well. I think we got to the, we did pretty well. We got to the semis at least I can't remember. I don't think we won that. We didn't win it but we did well and but they were great. I went to the party and it was, I didn't feel like an outcast. Yes you would not see her here you know like the ATA tournaments were social events as well as athletic. Yeah. The whole week. So it was, they had barbecue, we had barbeques and everything. And he went to, was a weekend tournament. What year was that? 1973 or four, 73 I think. See but when you went to an ATA tournament you went for the weekend. You didn't really go

0:30:45 Art Carrington: play a match and then leave.

0:30:46 Jack Broudy: No it didn't feel like New England at all. It didn't feel like any LTA at all. Nationals traditionally people would go on the campus with the ATA Nationals they might not see a ball get hit. They played Pinnacle and Bridge for a whole week. And backgammon. The whole country. And backgammon. Yeah. And I mean if you had that crowd of people so you know when you're talking about 5,000 people going through a tournament, you know like the ATA was the event. Now you know the sad part about it is back in those days Arthur, everybody knew everybody because you had to go through the ATA, they had to endorse you. Okay. So

0:31:24 Art C: now only the top players go to the USTA Nationals Tennis know each other. That's right. They don't know each other around the country. They don't get the support system that we had. Because they don't know one another all over the world. It's such a stressful because they don't come from tennis communities. That's what like Osaka and all the girls unfortunately I feel for them because they were developed to be gladiators. They didn't come in a community tennis club. They came up in programs that were trying to make champions and not build communities. And so we came out of community that you had an opportunity to be but the emphasis was like first of all it's amateur tennis. So getting a full scholarship to Hampton was like pro for me. How much more pro you want? You got a full scholarship to college.

0:32:13 Jack Broudy: That's your bucket list right there. Man that was you know so like those days. So it was a whole different kind of environment with the ATA. You know I think that's people always say that the reason the Europeans are kicking our asses so much in the last 20 years is because of the rackets and the fact that they play soccer. And I think those are two big reasons. But I spent a lot of time over there the last 30 years. Maybe altogether five, six years. It's still a little bit like the 70s or 60s back there. It's still more grassroots. And I do think there's something healthy about the community of tennis players. You know they spend and over there they spend the whole day playing and they play with anybody.

0:32:58 Jack Broudy: Or if there's nobody to play they hit against the wall. But today here in the United States it's a business. So you know part of what ruined American tennis? They just getting rid of all the clay courts. See when I was young I had to be around the older club members and learn how to. We had to roll water, roll calcium chloride. We had to put the lime, lime, lines down the street. So I learned from the older guys a whole culture around preparation before you enjoy something. That's right. And then when you finish playing you got to clean the court for the guy after you. Oh community men's thing man. It was so incredible what I learned from Mr. Dave. He had to be the first one that the the white guy that sold the courts to. So Mr. Davis knew how to do the courts and then there was a local undertaker. And they're in their 90s. They just haven't been 90th year. And so these are kind of people that were the original startup people you know back in the day. And it's over 100 years ago that there's North End. But unfortunately by 1975 North End Tennis Club was disbanded. The players were playing at, like I said, that's when like the doctors, the Jewish doctors would invite the black doctors, why don't you come and join our club. You understand? And so then the little two court facility was limited. It was great when you didn't know anything else or had anything else. Once you saw other stuff and had more opportunity then the people left.

0:34:41 Art Carrington: Yeah. Yeah. No, I think you're right about the clay courts Art because I was brought when I was 11, I got my first job. I got five dollars a day and I brushed the courts every hour. We had four courts and I could walk to them and I brushed those you know 10 times a day every hour on the hour. I'd brush them and then do the lines and then once every day or every other day. I can't remember. I did the calcium chloride with the rolling and all that and it was more of a lifestyle back then. Now it's more of a business and I think that's why you see so much of the mental anguish. You know, I don't know what you want to call it today with a lot of these players but you never saw that back in the 70s. We knew there was pressure but it was still more of a well if I don't win today I'll get it tomorrow. You know like I said it was more community. It wasn't as much tennis so these people don't have any time to relax. They don't have any holistic time really to like take a walk. They walk on treadmills. They don't walk out in the country, walk in the woods or anything where it's healthy. Walk on a treadmill. You understand? So to pace the people like you got to burn out because you're putting too much in a short period of time so then the mental burnout comes. Ash, we had all of Black America behind him. Everybody wanted to see Arthur successful. Everybody in ATA wanted Arthur to be successful and so they came from communities. These people don't come from communities. I mean Serena and Venus are great but they didn't build tennis in the Black community. Their success is not I don't see it in terms of you got a lot of fathers with their daughters out there trying to make it in the pro world. Right. But you don't have that community tennis that you had. No I think it's very unhealthy compared to the way we grew up. I think we're actually very lucky in retrospect. Well without a doubt. You know what I'm saying? Because like I said, one is a community and the other was just pure gladiator. You go to academies you know like when I watch the commentators on television I watch and I see the way they talk about Coco's forehand. They let the whole world know if you stay up in her forehand, if you're good enough to stay up in that forehand long enough you'll break through. Now so I say one of your coaches like I am, why do these people let Coco have an unorthodox forehand when she's been playing tennis all these years and they haven't coached her to the point where she could you know put her hand on top of the racket instead of being under the racket all the time. Get her hand up on that's where the nunchucks and things. I'll be like Coco. I'll show you how to do the nunchucks and then you'll have dexterity in your fingers and in your hand and your grippers like that. You won't have to go, they hitting with the back of their forearms instead of your forearm is not rolling over the, they're behind

0:37:27 Jack Broudy: you're up in here man

0:37:28 Jack Broudy: and you know. A lot of these players are great and we try to use everybody as an example but you can't. You can't. I mean that's why a guy like Federer was so great for the game because you finally got somebody who had a beautiful figure eight who was balanced as hell and he lined up every shot. He didn't jump out of his skin to hit the ball and that was really necessary for the game. I never thought that the commentators or even the pros utilized him enough because that guy, that man alone could have grown the game if you used him in the right way. Exactly. His style is so much healthier. Yes.

0:38:09 Art C: Yes. It's a healthier way of playing. You know

0:38:13 Jack Broudy: it's funny even when guys are growing up like I remember when I was watching Andy Murray, one of my other favorite players, beautiful game. The first thing I said was that serve is going to kill him. That serve is going to hurt his low back and his hip. The first time I saw Patrick Rafter with his shoulders level on the serve instead of slope like it should be right, one hip up, one hip down but he was like he came into it like Hingis. I said that guy's shoulders going to be beat up by the time he's 25. Sure enough Murray went out with a bad hip. Rafter went out at 26 years old with a bad shoulder. I mean you can see it coming but these guys they're treated like horse and you know what I mean and they just inject them, go out there, you're a tough guy, you can do it and it doesn't serve them very well. Right. In my opinion I don't know. Let me ask, go ahead. Go ahead. No, you asked the question. I was going to ask you a little, in reading your book I learned a lot and

0:39:11 Art Carrington: one of the things I never knew about was Davis Cup. Please tell us because I know people are going to want to know. Tell us about Davis Cup tennis and Mr. Davis because I never knew exactly where that came from. Okay so from my research I saw in 1921 I'm in the basement of I think it was Mount Hoyo and I'm recomposing them. I got a in order to get a whole page I might have to have six printouts of the microfilm just to read the whole page or read the article. So in 1921 all of a sudden I see Dwight Davis umpires. I was like

0:39:51 Jack Broudy: what? This is in the black newspaper you understand? So I'm like-I read it, I read it. You know so I go there, it was mind-blowing. Okay

0:40:00 Art Carrington: so now we get to 1923 and I see where Dwight Davis let Eugene Kinkle Jones and Gerald-he was uh the head of the Urban League nationally in New York. They lived in Flushing. Eugene Kinkle Jones and Gerald Norman was one of the first educators big time in New York State. Dwight Davis created the National Public Parks part of the USTA. You are familiar with that?

0:40:33 Art C: Yes. That didn't exist. So under the existing USLTA he couldn't get no black dudes in there. So this is what I saw in 1921. He experienced a class of black people not only were they-he experienced a black class of black people you understand? Yes. Doctors and the lawyers and these were the early on people. So these were the ones that didn't have the greatest games. They were the first ones but they were educated you understand? So I see in 19-this 1921 ATA Nationals was at the suburban gardens an amusement park owned by black people founded in 1920 and existed until about 1945. The real estate value made them sell out. But anyway they had tennis courts and a stadium for the ATA Nationals. Dwight Davis umpires and then I see in 1923 he forms the National Public Parks part of the USTA and lets these two black guys play in a tournament in there. Right? Now Oscar Johnson goes on to win the National Public Parks tournament in 1948. Still no appearance for out there anybody in US Open or anything. California would allow-they were playing National Public Parks Championship was played in California, Oscar Johnson lived in California, Jimmy McDaniel was from California, California black guys had opportunities to play with Bobby Riggs, Punch and Ballot, all kind of people. Right? So I see where these guys played in the National-so like I said Oscar Johnson wins the National Public Parks and then in 1961 Doug Sykes you gotta remember-look at him-I do remember that. Doug Sykes played number one for University of California at Berkeley and so those two won the National Public Parks. But anyway 1923 is when Dwight-and that alerted me I was like this guy Dwight Davis was much more than people realized he was. Yeah that's-now I'm seeing the guy I know he founded Davis Cup and he but now I'm seeing racially that he was out in front.

0:42:46 Art C: Now you got to realize that I went to Hampton University. You know one of the things that I realized-I just brought to my attention that very few blacks and much much fewer whites know that there were many black, historically black colleges that were founded by white men. People don't know that. So you don't-So like Hampton University was founded by Samuel Chapman Armstrong, a white guy that was a graduate of Williams College and he was a general during the Civil War. See? Wow! General Howard at Howard University. These guys they were generals over what they called the Negro troops and fell in love with black people in America and their plight as ex-as just being freed and these guys founded schools. You know and I start realizing why a lot of times white men in America get hostile because we don't have enough affirmative talk about the contributions that were made racially. So that's what I'm saying. I had a lot of Jewish guys that helped me help George Stewart, non-Jews that helped me white. You understand? And so we had these people that-so that's what I really realized that at Hampton we have Samuel Chapman Armstrong the founder. Then our major hall is Ogden Hall. That was another general Ogden. You understand? Howard University got an Ogden with them. You understand? So if you investigate you find quite a few black colleges that were-Founded by white guys.

0:44:28 Jack Broudy: Yeah man

0:44:29 Art C: and it's amazed me that people don't know that you know so-Do you think it's politics? You know because they want us like this. People don't know history. That's what I'm saying. I'm like yo man I told a guy this morning I said you know what? If other whites knew that a lot of these black colleges were founded by whites they would donate. They would donate to the cause. They would understand what it's all about. People don't know anything about abolitionists now. So he's really you know what I mean? We say that's why it matters but don't nobody make it seem all black. They were really you know what I'm saying? It's gotta-it's not weaved. It's not weaved together. It's not the story. We didn't get-I keep-I keep alone. You know I keep wondering if it's done purposely. I mean I hate to say it and I don't want to get too political. I don't want to get too political but I mean you know people like when you're at odds with each other. They like when you're-Somebody somebody's in control but you know what? We know as coaches see one thing I know as a coach that we're not coaching kid or adult anybody. We have a dominant and a non-dominant. The athlete can only be as good as his non-dominant is. That's right. That's what the figure eight is all about.

0:45:56 Jack Broudyn: That's right. That's right.

0:45:57 Art C: Equality. It's about balance and all-That's right. Oneness and oneness. And so we're not about oneness in America. They didn't have it weaved. It's non-dominant. Look at the black man is non-dominant. They call him a minority and push him over to the side. That's right. You know what I'm saying? That's not weaving him in. So we understand that's what we're gonna weave him in. Then we gotta have a situation where there's balance. We gotta have coordination. You don't have to coordination. Any coach knows you gotta get the kid coordinated before he can-You understand? So it's like that's why we load. That's why we do it the way we do it. You understand? So yinging and yinging and you're saying-That's right.

0:46:35 Art Carrington: I prefer that. I prefer that.

That's how it's gotta happen. This America is-Yeah, that's a-We got a chance of being the big-You know, never was a melting pot. Nothing melted. We just had a pot of-Nothing melted, man. You understand? Now we hope and how we fuse this together into a-Like when I do the Cinewally sticks, I'm weaving. I'm weaving. You understand? But we're not weaved in this society.

0:47:05 Jack Broudy: No, I think that's a really good point. But that's where sports brings it in though. I told you, I traveled with Weldon for like seven months. We traveled the watch tour and boy, you learn a lot just hanging out. But on the other hand, you also learn that there's not much difference. You're both two tennis players out there slugging it out against the world

0:47:28 Art C: and-Hey, when you get up here and Steve Siegel and I in Leon Soule in England, getting on our way to Bournemouth and whatnot. And Steve, we get off. He's a Jewish cat that never ate outside of the-Yeah, I've heard of him. Jersey. You understand? So he was cautious about eating anything and he, I'm a black dude. You should have tuned the two of us. It was hilarious. He is a black guy that never slept outside of a black neighborhood until he went to college and he is Siegel. You understand? So yeah, we were-And it's funny you bring that up. That's the same with me. I used to spend weekends

0:48:03 Jack Broudy: or when we played Eastern tournaments, I'd spend weekends at Weldon's house. His dad was a reverend, reverend Washington. Yeah, and he was cool guy. Reverend White Rodney. Yeah. That's right.

0:48:14 Jack Broudy: And they lived in Queens. So I got an eyeful. I'm just a Jewish kid from Connecticut and at 17, all of a sudden I'm spending a week at a time, Christmas vacation, stuff like that. And I'm just hanging out with these brothers and sisters drinking Ripple. I can't remember what the fuck. It was just so different for me. And you could play back then.

0:48:40 Jack Broudy: I remember, God, this is weird. I remember I used to make Weldon laugh because I would imitate all the older guys that would come to visit his father. But you could do that back then. I used to call one guy

0:48:55 Jack Broudy: the understand man because every other second he'd go, you understand? I'm like, fuck yeah, I understand. I'm sitting right here in front of you. And he would laugh at me because I'd make fun of him. Or there were guys that had these idiosyncrasies.

But you could play back then. Maybe it was because it was New England. I don't know. But it just didn't seem for the tennis players like that big of a stretch. Now, maybe it was at the country club level. I don't know. But I was never a country club guy. Scalsi Park, my swimming tennis club, which was I think $75 for the summer. So it wasn't like a rich tennis club.

Art C: But we know it's America. So we know there's anti-Semitism. We know what it is. So we know these ingredients in America. I know that traveling with a Jewish boy, not like traveling with some straight up wasp, the different kind of thing, man. Peter Fremling was a different singer. Peter Fremling was a different scene than Jeff Miller, than Steve Siegel. Peter was my boy. Peter used to come around from the time he was, you know what I mean? But I knew Peter's father as a player. We used to meet up, meet, Stiegels. We would go to the New Jersey Tennis Championship, played at the Westfield Tennis Club. But I mentioned the Westfield Indoor Club. That was built by Jews in the late 60s. The Westfield Tennis Club was built in the early 1900s. And it was, you know, maybe one Jewish person after a while. You know, back in the day it was like it was exclusive. And that's where the state champs, so Siegel and I would go. But we know we ain't going to no banquets. We're not going to no parties. So you know,

0:50:40 Art Carrington: back in those days I used to ask the guys like, how does a young black man know the friendly white guy from the white guys as the enemy when they all live in the same neighborhood? That's what I used to do. That's a good point. That's interesting. And now I know who to trust and who not to trust. You know, living in St. Nick, you know, it was an introduction to a different world from those guys, but for my boys also, because I would bring in a texture of conversation that was completely, you know, different than what they were accustomed to. When I was playing in Florida with Weldon, we would see old signs, I think I told you, old signs where you could barely read it. But I took, I mean, I took a mental picture and I thought I'd never seen anything like that. I thought this was way passe, but it was from the 60s. And it said, no Jews, no blacks, no dogs. It was at a tennis country club. And I kid you not, I read it and it really hit me hard because I'm like, I never thought I would see that and feel unwelcome. So, you know, so, but we were playing in Florida and, you know, that's the south. So, I'm guessing things got better in the mid 60s to the 70s is what I'm thinking. Well, listen, think about the little tennis clubs that the little circuits were played in in Florida, right? Yeah. In them neighborhoods like where Trayvon Martin got killed. Think about what I felt like, man, I had 10 rackets stacked up in the back of my car window. Like, I'm not lost. I'm supposed to be here. I know where I'm going. You understand? And so, just think, but when you think about Trayvon, which was a couple of years ago, think about what I think about in the 70s and all that. That's what happened to me. I didn't want to do it.

0:52:26 Art Carrington: I didn't want to be a teaching pro. I could go to New Jersey and make money, live a good life, go to New York, spar. Everything about Vitas Geralitis was my boy. He copied all my style. He was a great guy. Vitas would come to the Harlem Armory, Dickie Stockton, Vitas Gerolitis, Henry Bunniss, you understand, Bob Benz, everybody come to the Harlem Armory. Everybody in those days would come to the Harlem Armory, you understand, and we would do our thing.

Jack B: That's funny. I did that too back in the early 70s. I went there with Paul Gerken, John Nogrady, and a few others. And we would do these, not exhibitions, we'd bring the kids out on the court, mostly black kids, and we'd hit with them and we'd give them some lessons. I was only a teenager.

Art C: Back in the day, we had tournaments there. So I played in a tournament, the Clean Air Classic, back at the 66th Street Armory, Park Avenue. That was high class. But we played the qualifying tournament at the Harlem Armory, and then the main event was at 66th and Park Armory. So I saw what their club was like in there. Their armory club was totally different than the 42nd and Fifth Avenue Harlem Armory club. You understand, the

0:53:39 Art Carrington: Park Avenue club was all indoors. It's been like that since the 1920s or before. And it was really an indoor complex. Yeah. One of the issues with indoors, and like you say, marginalized or whatever, people indoors is very expensive. Even now, I went to New York a few years ago to coach, and I didn't pay for it. Luckily, my client was wealthy enough, but I think it's about a buck and a quarter just to play tennis for an hour. $120 bucks. Yeah, it's a lot of money. Sure. It's a lot of money. I mean, that was another thought I had.

0:54:15 Jack Broudy: When you were younger, did you play in the winter outdoors?

0:54:20 Art Carrington: Listen, the most beautiful thing about my life is that we had an armory where the indoor tennis was that was within walking distance from where I lived, just like the outdoor black club. Then the armory was on the border of the black neighborhood. And so, it was like $10 a season all winter, 50 cents an hour. So me and my people, I had indoor tennis accessible to me all through my... It was amazing. My life has been amazing. You know what I'm saying? Somebody designed it for me. I didn't design this life. You've been blessed. I'm living it, but it was designed somewhere else. I hear you. You've been blessed. I think you have. I think a lot of us have. If we get to live our whole lives playing tennis and teaching tennis and teaching life through tennis, I think we are blessed. I really do. You've seen me the day that this woman... So I'm giving this woman a lesson 25 years ago. So she comes to me and she says, what can you do with this? And it's a rainbow gymnastic ribbon. So I say to myself, I say, why doesn't this white woman just leave me alone? You understand? So I take the ribbon, but I'm like, okay. About two days later, I'm at home doing my rhythmic saying, I'm doing my eights, but I don't know it. And I've been doing it all my life. All our dances are all... Everything black is in here. You understand? Exactly. All of a sudden, I pick up the ribbon. Here it is right here, brother. Yep. I'm familiar. And so I started moving that ribbon. Hold on. You understand? As the music was going, I started doing forehands and backhands. And I was like, oh my God, there it is. I didn't have a conversation with anybody. I was like,

no. So then my life changed. And then I really do stuff with bullwhips. I don't know if you've seen me. Me too. Me too. You know what's funny? You're like truly like a brother from another mother because I did all... Honestly,

0:56:54 Art Carrington: we'll talk about this the next time. We'll stick to the ATA. We got to stick to something. By the way, I can't see you. Bring the camera down a little bit. There we go. So

0:57:04 Jack Broudy: yeah. No, no. Like I said, brother from another mother because I've been doing the bullwhip and I've been using those ribbons. I did something for Deepak Chopra about 20 years ago. He has a thing called Chopra Kids in La Costa. And I used the ribbons with those kids and had the kids on the eight boards doing the ribbons. That's funny, man. That's funny. Go ahead. Well, I think this is too easy for us to digress if you know what I mean. We've got these offshoots that we can shoot off into. Yeah. So easily. In fact, if you do me the honor, next time we talk, give me a next time, number one, I want to talk eight. I want to talk rhythm. I want to talk music. I want to talk other things that are tangent to tennis. There's two parts of me. There's the history and there's what I do now, what I do. Right. So whole rhythm and movement, whole, you know what I mean?

0:58:06 Jack Broudy: Like you see those clubs, you see them clubs in the background. Yeah, I'm familiar. I watch everything you do. I

0:58:16 Jack Broudy: Okay. So we got this,

0:58:19 Art Carrington: yeah, we're going to go into the music part of it. Yes, we are. Well,

0:58:22 Jack Broudy: let me ask you some more questions. Number one, because we've talked for a while now, let me ask you about your book. Where can people get it? And then the next question is, can I help promote it on my site? Because I would be honored. I work with Dick Gould and some other great people like yourself. And I think, well, not like yourself, different, but great people as well. No, I don't know. And I'd like to be able to offer it to people on my site and my members. The

0:58:50 Art Carrington: best way is to message me at Faithbrook, Art Carrington. Okay. Right. I'll put that in writing on this summary. Or you can call Nasir. Can I give you the number? Sure. Go ahead. I'll also write it down, but go ahead and give it to people. Call Nasir at 413-687-8758. Okay. Who can contact me at 413-977-1967, the one you have. 1967, right. And like I said, I'd be happy to, and I feel great about putting it on. I've got some pretty neat things on my site as well. I don't know if you've been to my site. If not, I'll have to get you over there one day. I'll get over there this evening. Just cool. Yeah. I'd like to put you over there because that's where I have my boards and all the stuff that I use. Will you send me a link to it or do I just Google you?

0:59:53 Art Carrington: No, I'll send you a link. I'll send you a link. But yeah, I'd love to be able to offer it there because we might get a whole different group of people coming to my site. And they all come for the same reason, by the way. You'd love my members. Everyone in my group all do the figure eight. They're all believers. So you'd love that. Yeah. Same thing with my intercore, my parents, all my, you know, yeah. Yeah. And we talk about infinity. That's why I knew you'd pick up on Rudolph Steiner because he was kind of a Renaissance man back in the mid 1800s. And he talked all about projective geometry, things that you seem to talk about yourself, but you don't use those exact words. But I figured you might have researched him a little bit. Well, this woman told me about him in the club a couple years ago. Yeah, a club member. She had been like, you know, you got to get to him. So let me ask you the last questions. What happened to the ATA? And when did it go? Because like I said, I played it in the 70s, but then I stopped hearing about it, like in the mid 80s or something.

1:00:54 Art Carrington: Well, see, the ATA kind of lost its mission of bringing black tennis players developing, you know, like promoting tennis in African America that they started wanting to like compete at one point with the USDA as far as developing junior players. You don't have the finances for that. And so what happened when the ATA, like you played in the tournament, the ATA never got to it. It wasn't like 4.05 points. So what happened was the successful middle class blacks that would go to the ATA traditionally, they didn't want to go get killed by HBC players. It was only one. It's not like the year is open where you could just go to the ATA and do other things. It became a one tournament organization. The national became the one tournament. We didn't have the new intersectional events that we had, the infrastructure that we had in black America. Like I said, a lot of people got, you know, like-So you start to lose your grassroots-Well, what happened is, well, the talented 10th that they used to say, we had to educate the talented 10th of black people. This is some old stuff, you understand, to be the teachers of black people. Once the talented 10th gets integrated into a neighborhood that now is economics, they can buy their way in, then you lose all of that leadership. It's gone. Yeah. It gets diluted. It gets diluted. So that's why I said the Jewish cats kept their clubs. They didn't give up all their clubs. But black America, when they got the call, we bought the integration, integrated into another club, you understand? So there's no community. That club is away from the community that we're-You know what I mean? So that's-You lost your focus. The ATA lost its focus a bit. Yeah. And the ATA nationals, they had 400 kids at the ATA nationals this year. The ATA nationals is really big with the national junior tennis league population. That's who goes to play. It fills that ATA void. The national junior tennis league pumps money into sending the kids to the ATA nationals. You understand? And so the-So the nationals are still going on, but all those local like Scousy Park, they're all gone. Yeah. You know where the nationals goes on? At the national training center in Florida. They have like six, 700 players that come in between adults and kids. But it's the national junior tennis league that's carrying it, not black middle-class America.

1:03:50 Art Carrington: I see. I see. So it's really diluted at this point. Yeah. You don't have it as a-You know, it's not a focal point of black middle-class America. They can go a lot of places now. They got a lot of recreational opportunities. And when they want to raise consciousness, they go to different events that will do that. That if that's-You know what I mean? But the kids-So now you got these kids in a lot of private schools and whatnot. So a lot of times you see a black event with the more upper middle-class black kids would be all those kids that live in neighborhoods without other black kids. They need other comrades that are socio-ec-Like, like, I'm in Amherst. So I got black faculty. My people are, you know, faculty at Amherst College, different colleges, UMass, whatnot. You know, they're tenure at these places. So that's a different person than, you know, a tennis league person. That's primarily a different-You know what I mean? So the black guy with money will take his son to a club where Jack Brody is in Connecticut and get some lessons. He doesn't have to go to the National Junior Tennis League in Stanford where it's an urban 501C3-Right. So for me, like in my business, I've always been proud. Like I had my summer camp that I had for many years, Bill Cosby's kids, Jim Rice, the baseball, all the top shelf black people would send their kids to my camp in the summer. And I was like, in the summer. And I used to tell people on campus, the president of college, that's why we have the indoor facility and all the facilities. I would tell them, this is not a fresh air fund black people. These are Weldon Rogers people. These are, you understand, this is not, you know, this is Brown here, baby. You see how this is-I dig it. This is not the fresh air fund. This is not the National Junior Tennis League. This is not some funding that somebody white funded. But let's talk one more time for junior sakes about to know is to grow. I still believe that college tennis is a great thing. And that's where you ought to go because such a small percentage make it in tennis. And I'd like to get your thoughts finally on that because I'm sure you've got some. First of all, you're funny. I put that in books, a lot of books, when I sent it to Tiaffo and different people, obviously to know is to grow. So that's what I've used that so many times and add that to the things we have in common. And my grand, you know, I got two granddaughters playing at LSU, right? I do great team down there. Boy, they're doing great. LSU listen, I don't know how they're doing, but you know, I don't really follow it because I get emotional. So I stay away from it. I follow it. They're doing great. Okay, cool. Well, you know, that's still a life of the, of my little sport. Hey, listen, let me tell you something, Jack. I'm proud of the fact that I tell everybody that when they start with me, you started in a place that has a lot of rich history that's different. This is not, especially what I love to tell black kids, this is not a fresh air fun. This is some stuff that goes way back with me that I'm passing to you. And so I'm very proud of the history and my mentors and of the ATA. I don't know how to grow it without the end, grow it. Hey, listen, I don't want to talk about it on air. So I hear you. We need more participation from the weldings and the arts and, you know, the people that really came through it. We need, you know, like, I think I got a hot, my Facebook page has more dialogue than the ATA. I understand. Yep. I agree. Participation and integration, both. I mean, yeah, yeah, yeah. That's what you do. So anyway, all right. When's the next one? When's the next one? Let's do it. Let's do it. We'll do it either this week or next, because like I said, we got to spend at least an hour on the eight because you and I,

1:07:59 Jack Broudy: I can't imagine we have much different, but we might have a few things that we could add to each other's repertoire, you know?

1:08:05 Art Carrington: Got it. I'd like to. So, all right. Let's, we'll talk and set up the time for next week. Let's appreciate you, my friend. Thank you very much. All right. Thanks, Jack. We'll talk to you later, bro. You've got it. All right. Later.

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