Albuquerque daily citizen. [volume] (Albuquerque, N.M.) 1895-1903, 1902-01-20
~PlNG-PONG'S FAD.
The Little Game Of Indoor Tennis
That IS all the Rage.
IT is COMING WESTWARD.

Kansas City has gone ping pong
mad, says the Star. The fascinating
game has taken such a hold here that
dealers in ping pong sets are entirely
unable to supply the demand. They
are a week behind in their orders. Not
even circulars or descriptive matter
of the game are to be had. All of them
have been distributed, and the person
who has not as yet been able to secure
a ping BONG set is busy reading up on
the fine points of the game. Cards have
been supplanted, temporarily at least,
by this newest of parlor amusements.
In short. ping pong's the thing. and il
you would be with the high tide you
must forget other amusements in the
task of mastering the intricate mys.
teries of this latest of the late.
Ping pong is an Engnsh game. II
has London by the ears and is rapidly
making Roadway in Canada. In the
United States it's progress has been
somewhat slow. but it promises to be
before long the most popular of all in
door games. Combining light exercise
with excitement, uncertainty with skill,
it embraces most of the good features
to be sought after in a sport of that
character. It may be considered as
an outgrowth of the present tendency
towards outdoor exercise. The old,
rather languid method of entertain
ment. fails to amuse because excite
ment is lacking. All this accounts for
the record ping pong seems destined
to make.
The title of table tennis" under
which the game is more commonly
known on this side of the water, is
fully descriptive. Practically all it's
rules and features follow tennis very
closely. The net is stretched on an
ordinary table. the player uses a rae
quet which is a miniature reproduction
of a tennis racquet. while a small eel
luloid ball takes the place of the large
rubber one. OF course, Is the dis
tances are so much smaller. the pro-
portion of skill necessary is proper
tionately larger. The finer points of
the game. such as placing, cutting, vol
leying and so on, call for the exercise
of much deXterity. Besides this there
is one thing little done in tennis which
the ping pong expert must cultivate.
Feinting is referred to. Your ping
pong player aims a most tremendous
blow at the bit of celluloid, but checks
the hand quickly so that the racquet
barely touches the ball. Eternal vigil
ance is the price of success at ping
pong.
There is another advantage. Any
person, be 1t nan or woman. looks bet
ter with the glow of excitement bright
ening up the face. Graceful o w
ments always attract attention. Such
reasons are paramount. for women. at
least. Languor is decidedly out of
date. 1t was beginning to reign, but
ping pong has stopped it. That, too,
is a thing to be thankful for.
And in thinking of ping pong one be-
gins to wonder where he has seen the
game before. Has it not been popular
before, perhaps in a slightly different
form? 1t would seem so. Most prob
ably it is the old game of b%attledore
and shuttlecock come to life again,
with just a touch OF tennis. 1t is a
merger of the two games. The game
that little English princes and ladies
played centuries ago in their walled
gardens, combined with one of the
greatest outdoor sports ever devised,
has given us the ping pong of the
present. From present indications it
should have a greater vogue than most
Of it's predecessors