In this section we introduce the history of tennis ball manufacture in Australia and the invention of the first (or very early) tennis ball machine.

Australian Tennis Balls began manufacture in the early 1900’s, with three companies becoming prominent. The competition was fierce with many balls being imported in both covered (lawn) and uncovered (asphalt) versions. This ad from the 1909 Davis Cup Program held in Australia is a very early example promoting Australian made balls.  They were not considered high quality and imported balls remained popular.

Many of the Australian companies were already in rubber products manufacturing such as Barnet Class and Ormiston which produced raincoats and other waterproof clothing. Dunlop was famous for the development of the automotive tyre.

The big three makers Dunlop, Barnet Glass and Ormiston virtually created a cartel to own the Australian market and you can see some of their advertisements under that section while further pictures of finished products will be sourced for this section.

In 1926, Spalding also began ball manufacturing, in Melbourne, a plugless and stitchless ball. Learn more from the Spalding section.

Slazenger balls made in the UK were highly regarded, since they were sponsoring Wimbledon and were imported in large quantities. We are still researching Slazenger’s manufacturing lines from their Sydney plant to find if they ever produced locally.

Here is an interesting article from 1924 about Tennis Ball manufacture.

 Ball Making was a fast growing high volume business. The pictures below show the laborious job of branding each of the balls which included adding numbers or coloured spots so that players over many courts could identify matching pairs. These shots are circa 1945.

Pictures Courtesy National  Archives Australia

Top ref NAA A1200, L3188   Bottom ref NAA A6180, 10/4/72/3

As the war effort caused a diversion of precious resources, people had to ration and do with whatever could be acheived.

You can’t forsee this happening today. Recovering used tennis balls.

Ball machines were on the agenda in 1927/28 and in Renee Lacoste’s ” Lacoste On Tennis” he mentions making one to improve his practice sessions, however below we have an actual photo of one invented by an Australian,  Percy Jepson, who we suspect also ran an engineering firm producing Fruit Packing machinery, hence his experience with the technology. 

The ball machine was called the “Machine Gun” and subsequent testing by Pat O’Hara Wood at South Yarra indicated it was a idea of some merit.  The unit was demonstrated in Myers retail store and invited tennis players to attend. Maybe the visiting French team told Lacoste about what they had seen.

We found that Jepson Fruit Packing went in to liquidation in 1931, so unfortunately this interesting model may not have survived.

See the articles from The Argus in 1927 below. 

Another Australian Inventor, Mr J.R. Black  from Adelaide cam up with this ball machine in 1963
Photo Courtesy National Archives of Australia ref.  NAA A1200, L43279