This lot is closed. Bidding ended on 12/10/2001.
Dwight Filley Davis, a tennis-playing student at Harvard, organized a tournament at Boston's Longwood Cricket Club in 1900, inviting players from around the world to play for their countries. As the prize, he donated a large silver cup. That year, exactly one country - Great Britain - accepted. A century later, players from 129 countries vied for the Davis Cup, one of the most prestigious events in sports. Davis himself played on the U.S team that won the cup the first two years. Over 25 years later, when he was Secretary of War in Calvin Coolidge's cabinet, Davis wrote this letter dated March 8, 1927, declining an invitation to speak at an alumni club in Philadelphia, signing his name in black ink, and the rare signature of this sports pioneer rates a solid 9. The letter is in excellent condition.