Now, for the English-speaking world,
Siegfried Kuebler, an avid collector of rackets and
the inventor of the wide-body racket,
has translated his 1995 German volume,
Buch der TENNISRACKETS,
into English.
(His new book,
BOOK OF TENNIS RACKETS,
is subtitled,
from the beginning in the 16th century until about 1990.)
Not only has he accomplished this huge and important undertaking,
he has also added significant new material to this already
comprehensive reference source.
The 1995 edition, even being mostly in German, was still quite useful
to collectors as much material was still readable and the pictures
were, of course, perfectly useful without translation.
The book covers are nearly identical, belying the huge improvements found in the new translation.
The 1999 edition has seen a dramatic increase in the material and the
presentation of reference information.
Weighing in at over 7 pounds, the new edition adds both 2 pounds and over
200 pages to this hefty tome.
The bad news is that you will have to read it at a table or the blood to
your legs will be cutoff by the weight as you read spend hours perusing
this valuable material.
There are four main parts to both editions, listed below with the page counts
for both editions.
- Preliminary, Introduction, Historical Overview
(was 34 pages, now 51 pages)
- Manufacturers, or Makers and Models
(was 320 pages, now 433 pages)
- Patents
(was 62 pages, now 118 pages)
- Appendix
(was 7 pages, now 33 pages)
Overall (was 423 pages, now 635 pages)
- In Part 1, HISTORY, the collector will find more explanation on the Age of Tennis Rackets,
and entirely new sections covering
Ratings; Restoration and Care; Technical Tables; Terminology;
and Fields of Collecting.
Perhaps the most useful addition is a Table of Contents, detailed enough to include the page
number of each of the approximately 500 makers now included.
- In Part 2, MAKERS, aside from some more advertisements and other material,
Kuebler has added alphabetical model tables for selected makers and
includes additional reference material submitted by a handful of (mostly) American collectors.
The Alphabetical Model Tables, a great improvement over the earlier edition,
are included for 23 makers (with the notable exception of Kuebler rackets) and add
some 62 pages to the MAKERS section.
- In Part 3, PATENTS, not only has Kuebler added significantly more information, he has also revised
the format to make it more readable.
- In Part 4, APPENDIX, new reference material has been added, some of which was added after the
translation of the main portion of the book had already been undertaken, and is more appropriately
aligned with the HISTORY part.
New material here includes several alphabetically arranged tables for Photodecal rackets
and Winners of Major Tournaments.
A new section also includes a useful discussion of Woods Used in rackets.
While the main focus of Mr. Kuebler's book is on the technical aspects of the racket,
his discussion of the history of the sport is a good summary and more than adequately
provides information for the collector of 20th century rackets.
He also reviews rackets made of other materials and ends his recapitulation with the
early 1990s as by then the number of variations for any model was mind-boggling
due to the manufacturing techniques then in place.
Moreover, his new discussions relating to the technical aspects of rackets
are particularly useful to modern collectors.
IF YOU ARE A SERIOUS COLLECTOR OF TENNIS RACKETS, YOU NEED THIS BOOK.
This book represents the latest, and arguably, the most important addition
to the field of tennis racket collecting.
- It is encyclopedic in nature, covering makers for both America and the Continent.
- It is graphic, including hundreds of full-color photographs.
- It is (now) readable, providing hours of pleasure to the collector.
- It is indispensable to any serious collector of tennis rackets.
BUY IT!
It can be ordered directly from Mr. Kuebler at the following link.
website: www.racketantiques.com
email: Siegfried.Kuebler@t-online.de
Copyright © 2000 Clark H. Bensen, All Rights Reserved.
Updates or Additions? email to: clark@polidata.net Attn: Clark.
Rackets Home Page: WOOD TENNIS RACKETS, A Collector's Guide
URL for this Page:
http://www.polidata.net/rackets/sk1999.htm
updated: 2000-Oct-31