Some history about tennis in Barraba

History Notes for 10 September 2025 by Terry Threlfall

Tennis in Barraba – some history

A Book titled “Country Cracks – The story of NSW country tennis” by Ron McLean, published in 1984, has this to say “Two tennis playing families put the quiet little backwater of Barraba, in Northern NSW, on the map in the 1920s.  The Spencers and the Williams were typical country players of the time. ………….. Despite their isolation from the mainstream of big tennis for most of the year, two of them - Bob Spencer and Guy Williams – reached all but the top rung of the game.” (p 17).

Today a few snippets about Guy Williams.

In 2012, Julie Williams recording her family history, spoke to the late Mo Witten, then resident in Richardson House. He had this to say about Guy Williams playing one of the world’s best players of the 1920s and 30s:

Guy Williams played tennis against Jack Crawford who had just won at Wimbledon and was at Barraba for an exhibition match.  Mo was one of four boys who were given time off school to be ball boys for the match.  Guy Williams defeated Crawford, who then hurled his racquet into the net and said "bugger him!"  Mo went home and told his mother that "Mr Crawford was not a very nice man."

(Julie writes: I researched Jack Crawford's career and he won singles at Wimbledon in 1933, and mixed doubles in 1930.  So, for him to have already won at Wimbledon this must have been 1930 because Mo was at TAS in 1930-31.  But Crawford was in the Davis Cup team as early as 1928 so it could have been then.)

A Tamworth newspaper report from the same era (date and paper not recorded) tells us of other exploits of Guy Williams and other Barraba players: