The year 1975 was a landmark occasion in more ways than one for the US Open. Until then, the Championships of the United States had always been contested on the lawns. The tournament was held at the fabled Newport Casino from its inception in 1881, and remained at that location for no fewer than 34 years. Later, it was played at different grass court locations, most prominently and enduringly at New York’s storied West Side Tennis Club in Forest Hills.
In fact, once the tournament went “ Open” in 1968, it was contested on the grass at Forest Hills for seven years, but, in 1975, reacting to the changing climate in the game, the US Open commenced a three-year stretch on Har-Tru (clay-like) courts. That major and sweeping change in surface drew most of the headlines among media observers weighing in on the event.
But, from the standpoint of the public, another significant change took place that year which would have lasting implications. The clay court era at the US Open lasted a mere three years, but the advent of night matches under lights—introduced to popular acclaim in 1975—was something that was more than a passing fancy; it will last forever at this Grand Slam championship.
Across the decades, night matches at the US Open have offered working men, women and entire families the opportunity to enjoy watching tennis under appealingly dark skies and bright lights, above and beyond anything they had ever seen before.
The first night match ever played at the U.S. Open was the 1975 clash between New Zealand’s tenacious Onny Parun and the 1971 US Open champion Stan Smith. The previous three years on the grass at Forest Hills, Smith had acquitted himself well, reaching two quarterfinals and making one journey to the penultimate round.
But injuries had eroded Smith’s game considerably, and clay did not suit his attacking game. Parun picked him apart 6-4, 6-2. The match itself was cut from an essentially ordinary cloth. The fellow from New Zealand—a finalist at the 1973 Australian Open—toppled the once mighty Smith straightforwardly. American fans were left disappointed by the defeat of their man.
And yet, no one was unhappy about the new personality of the US Open. The combination of the clay and the night play was just what the tournament needed at that time. As British writer Rex Bellamy described it to his readers in World Tennis Magazine, “The grass was gone. After years of talk and negotiation and veiled threats from the players, something had been done. The gray-green clay was in the stadium, the Grandstand and two rows of courts directly behind the marquee, and there were towering light stanchions for night play; the flavor of Forest Hills had changed forever.”
