Sports Fact and Book Rec of the Day 7/8/2008

7/8/1961:
In the first all-British final at Wimbledon since 1914, Angela Mortimer defeats Christine Truman, 4-6, 6-4, 7-5, to win the ladies' singles championship. For the 29-year-old Mortimer, the victory is the culmination of an illness-plagued career. At various times, she battled through sinus trouble that affected her hearing, a serious viral infection and failing eyesight to win here after 12 years of trying. It's her third and last Grand Slam title after winning the French championship in 1955 and capturing the Australian crown in 1958.

Birthdays:
Harrison Dillard b. 1923
Roone Arledge b. 1931
John David Crow b. 1935
Jack Lambert b. 1952
Todd Martin b. 1970

1984:
John McEnroe routed Jimmy Connors 6-1, 6-1, 6-2, in the Wimbledon men's singles final.

"If the aging urchin faded back into obscurity, you can say this much for Jimbo: that losing one, one and two in the finals of Wimbledon is like losing 20 games in the majors. You have to be awfully good to get the opportunity." -Frank Deford, July 16, 1984

Packers Fact:
Ahman Green had a pair of long touchdown runs (31 yards and 83 yards) before an eventual 28-6 victory over Detroit on Kickoff Weekend was even one quarter old in 2001.

MAGIC SHOW

Two magicians in 1878 begin a rivalry that escalates through the years with such malice and ingenuity that it becomes part of the lives of the generations that follow. According to The Washington Post, The Prestige is “a dizzying magic show of a novel, chock-a-block with all the props of Victorian sensation fiction: seances, multiple narrators, a family curse, doubles, a lost notebook, wraiths, and disembodied spirits; a haunted house, awesome mad-doctor machinery, a mausoleum, and ghoulish horrors; a misunderstood scientist, impossible disappearances; the sins of the fathers visited upon their descendants.”

THE PRESTIGE, by Christopher Priest (Tor Books, 2005)