As is now traditional, U.S. Squash presented new members of the U.S. Squash Hall of Fame during the U.S. Open, the class of 2011 and the class of 2012. All five inductees, accompanied by past inductees, were honored with on-court presentations on the first night of the glass-court matches. Jack Herrick will have his formal induction ceremony this winter in Cleveland and Lenny Bernheimer and Tom Poor will have theirs in Boston.
On Monday 8 October U.S. Squash formally introduced Joyce Davenport into the Hall of Fame. Many friends and former partners and opponents came, including a large contingent from Berwyn Squash and Fitness Club where Joyce has worked for decades. Sharon Schwarze, a longtime doubles partner of Davenport (they won eleven straight national 40+ veterans doubles championships together), gave the formal introduction. Two nights later, U.S. Squash formally inducted Bob Callahan. Hundreds of friends, Princeton alums and the entire current team and staff came to the ceremony. Paul Assaiante, the Trinity squash coach, gave the introduction.
Class of 2011
Robert W. Callahan
Bob Callahan is the legendary coach at Princeton University. Raised in Philadelphia, he learned squash at the Cynwyd Club with pro Norm Bramall and played for Episcopal Academy. At Princeton he played on three national championship teams, including his senior year when he captained the Tigers to an undefeated 1976-77 season. A two-time All American, he was ranked fifth in the intercollegiates his senior year (he continued to be a top player: in 1989 he won the 30+ national hardball singles). In 1981 he returned to Princeton as men’s coach. In his thirty-one seasons to date, he has tallied a record of 303-65. He has led the Tigers to national team titles in 1982, 1993, and 2012, as well as ten Ivy League championships. He has coached five players to the national intercollegiate individual title. In 1982 Bob founded the world’s first major squash summer camp running it continuously ever since, and in 1998 he directed the World Junior Men’s Championships at Princeton, the first time the U.S. had ever hosted the world singles championship. He was twice the president of the College Squash Association and has been an executive committee member for thirty years. Bob has successfully mentored thousands of young athletes to be better squash players and better people.
Joyce V. Davenport
Joyce Davenport is a lesson in longevity. She began playing in the early 1960s under the tutelage of Cynwyd Club coach Norm Bramall. She won the national singles in 1965 and 1969. She won the national doubles in 1969, 1979, 1980, 1981, 1982, 1987, 1989, 1990, 1995 and the national mixed doubles in 1978, 1980, 1981,1984, 1989, 1992 and 1993. She played number one on a Wolfe-Noel Cup team and won the World 50+ softball singles in 1992 in Vancouver, B.C. She has won more than forty national age group titles in singles and doubles. Joyce was also part-owner and manager of Berwyn Squash, the oldest commercial squash club in the nation. At age seventy, she gives lessons regularly and also plays on the women’s pro doubles tour (she was ranked sixteenth in 2011-12). Withher competitive zeal and classic strokes, Joyce has won a national title in six different decades, a record for U.S. Squash.
John F. Herrick
Jack Herrick has been more influential globally than perhaps any other American in squash history. A Cleveland native, he played No. 1 at Dartmouth before graduating in 1960; in 1983 he won the 45+ World Masters in New Zealand, becoming the first American to win a world singles title. He was the head of Cleveland’s squash association and president of U.S. Squash from 1982 to 1984. He received the President’s Cup in 1988. He was the U.S. men’s team manager at the World Championships four times in the 1980s. Jack has held dozens of squash roles including president of the Jesters, chair of the Friends of Dartmouth Squash, a member of several World Squash Federation committees, and the commissioner of WPSA hardball tour. From 1994 to 2008 he was the board chair of the PSA men’s pro squash tour, traveling more than a million air miles to play a central role in the development of the game around the world.
Class of 2012
Leonard A. Bernheimer
Lenny Bernheimer has won more than thirty-five national age-group titles in singles (hardball and softball) and doubles. In 1977, he represented the US in the Maccabbiah Games in Israel and won the silver medal, and in 1978 he represented the US in the world championships in Ottawa, Canada. Along with Tom Poor, he was director of the Boston Open (for seventeen years, one of the majors on the pro hardball tour). Since then he has co-directed the pro doubles tour stop at the University Club in Boston and the Can-Am Cup. He was president of U.S. Squash in 1984-86 and president of the Jesters. He has also served as President of Massachusetts Squash and has been a Board member for more than four decades. Lenny is a founding board member of SquashBusters and has been Chair for the past thirteen years. He was awarded U.S. Squash’s President’s Cup in 1993.
Thomas M. Poor
Tom Poor has won more than 45 United States and Canadian national age-group singles and doubles titles. He won the Canadian open doubles in 1974, 1983, 1984, 1985 and 1990, twice reached the finals of the U.S open doubles, and with partner Lenny Bernheimer has won more than 20 national age-group tournaments. Tom was a member of the 1973 U.S. national team to the World Amateur Championships in South Africa and captain of the 1977 team in Canada. He and Lenny were directors of the Boston Open professional singles event for seventeen years and more recently the co-directors of the pro doubles tour stop at the University Club of Boston. He has been a board member of Massachusetts Squash for more than four decades, and was given the Mass Squash President’s Award in 2007. Tom has directed dozens of junior squash tournaments and is the current chair of the Mass Squash Junior Committee. He has served as a member of the U.S. Squash board of directors and has been an invaluable member of the of the U.S. Squash investment committee. He is a founding board member of SquashBusters.
