The Missouri Athletic Club opened its doors on Sept. 13, 1903, in the Boatman's Bank Building at 4th Street and Washington Ave. in downtown St. Louis. Founder Charles Henry Genslinger had opened clubs in New Orleans and New York.
A fire destroyed the original clubhouse in March 1914. Within two weeks, a committee was appointed to design and erect a new and more elaborate clubhouse on the same location. The project was funded with bonds sold to prominent St. Louis businessmen, including August A. Busch.
Designed by William B. Ittner, the present-day Downtown Clubhouse opened on March 1, 1916, with a gala celebration attended by 5,000 people. The 10-story facility was grander than the original, with contains two restaurants, a ballroom, a barber shop, numerous private meeting rooms, a reading room, a billiard parlor, a rooftop deck, more than 75 guest rooms, and full-service athletic facilities. The athletic facilities include weight training, a pro shop, whirlpools, tanning beds, saunas, trainers, pros, a masseuse, squash courts, racquetball courts, and handball courts.
The Missouri Athletic Club has renovated and expanded its West Clubhouse numerous times over the years. Some of the largest projects took place in 1998, 2004, and 2016.
West Clubhouse
In 1995, the Missouri Athletic Club purchased the Town and Country Racquet Club, which was built in 1975, and opened it as the MAC's West Clubhouse on June 16 of that year.
The sprawling facility, with more than 178,000 square feet of space, has a 25-meter outdoor swim and dive pool, two restaurants and bars, private event spaces, eight indoor tennis courts, squash courts, racquetball courts, a basketball court and gymnasium, and a fitness center.
History
Entrepreneur Charles Henry Genslinger came to St. Louis in 1903, during the lead-up to the 1904 Louisiana Purchase Exposition. Having organized amateur athletic and social clubs in New York City and New Orleans, he persuaded local prominent citizens to fund a similar club.[1]Boatmen’s Bank donated a seven-story building at Fourth Street and Washington Avenue to the Club, which adopted “Missouri Athletic Club” as its name.[1] More than 3,200 members enrolled before to Club opened in September 1903.[1]
Upon its founding, the MAC joined the Amateur Athletic Union, which allowed its members to participate in the 1904 Summer Olympics, also held in St. Louis.[1] As part of the AAU, the MAC formed basketball, swimming, track, baseball, boxing, wrestling, bowling, and billiards teams which competed throughout the United States.[1]
In 1914, the MAC's clubhouse was destroyed by a fire that killed 30 members, guests, and staff.[1] The club decided to construct a new building in its place, which opened in 1916.[1] This has been the clubhouse ever since.[1] From 1916 to 1939, the MAC was renamed the Missouri Athletic Association.[1]
In 1943, the Missouri Athletic Club Apollos (Often referred to as the MAC Apollos) were founded, making them the MAC's oldest "Club Within the Club."[2]
In the late 1960s, the all-white, all-male club voted to allow Black men to join.[3]
In 1988, the Club’s members voted overwhelmingly to admit female members.[1] The vote came after John C. Shepherd, whose membership in the all-male MAC and the all-white Bellerive Country Club had drawn national scrutiny and criticism, withdrew from his nomination to be Attorney General Edwin Meese III's deputy at the U.S. Justice Department.[4][5]
In 1995, the MAC bought the Town and Country Racquet Club in West St. Louis County.[1] The club spent $2 million to upgrade the facilities and reopened them as the Missouri Athletic Club's West Clubhouse.[1] The West Clubhouse was re-renovated for $8 million in 2003.
By 2006, St. Louis Magazine reported, "The Missouri Athletic Club, one of the largest clubs in the country, lost cachet after admitting first women and then anybody who could pay."[6]
The New York Athletic Club is an American organization, and a private social club and athletic club in New York state. Founded in 1868, the club has approximately 8,600 members and two facilities: the City House, located at 180 Central Park South in Manhattan, and Travers Island, located in Westchester County. Membership in the club is by invitation only.
Montreal Amateur Athletic Association is Canada's oldest athletic association, located in Montreal, Quebec. It was renamed as the Club Sportif MAA or just MAA in 1999 after a brush with bankruptcy, but is still widely known as the MAAA. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, the MAA was one of the most important sporting institutions in Canada, and North America, with affiliated teams winning ice hockey's Stanley Cup and Canadian football's Grey Cup.
The Hermann Trophy is awarded annually by the Missouri Athletic Club to the United States's top men's and women's college soccer players.
Matthew (Matt) John McKeon is an American retired soccer midfielder who played seven seasons in Major League Soccer. He earned two caps with the United States men's national soccer team and was a member of the 1996 U.S. Olympic soccer team.
Chaminade College Preparatory School is an independent, Catholic school, administered by the Marianist Order for boys in grades six through twelve in the Archdiocese of St. Louis. The school is located in Creve Coeur, Missouri.
The Olympic Club is an athletic club and private social club in San Francisco, California.
Christian Brothers College High School is a Lasallian Catholic college preparatory school for young men in Town and Country, Missouri, a suburb of St. Louis. It is located in the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Saint Louis and is owned and operated by the De La Salle Christian Brothers Midwest District and is the second oldest Lasallian school in the United States.
Alan Trost is an American former professional soccer player who played as a midfielder. He played collegiate soccer at Saint Louis University where he won the 1969 and 1970 Hermann Trophy as the player of the year. His professional career includes years in both the North American Soccer League (NASL) and Major Indoor Soccer League (MISL). He also was a member of the 1972 U.S. Olympic soccer team. He went on to earn 14 caps with the U.S. national team, scoring one goal. He coached professionally with the St. Louis Steamers of MISL and continues to coach youth soccer. He is a member of the National Soccer Hall of Fame.
Mike Seerey is a former U.S. soccer forward, and a two-time recipient of the Hermann Trophy as the outstanding collegiate soccer player of the year. He played four seasons in the North American Soccer League and was a member of the U.S. soccer team at the 1972 Summer Olympics.
Vashon High School is a high school of the St. Louis Public Schools in St. Louis, Missouri. When it opened in 1927, it was the second high school for black students in St. Louis.
The Kansas City Club, founded in 1882 and located in the Library District of Downtown Kansas City, Missouri, USA, was the oldest gentlemen's club in Missouri. The club began admitting women members in 1975. Along with the River Club on nearby Quality Hill, it was one of two surviving private city clubs on the Missouri side of Kansas City. Notable members include Presidents Harry Truman and Dwight D. Eisenhower, General Omar Bradley, and political boss Tom Pendergast. It closed in 2015.
The Missouri Athletic Club's Downtown Clubhouse is a historic building having Renaissance Revival architecture. It was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 2007.
The Milwaukee Athletic Club, is a private, social and full-service athletic club.
Portland Tennis & Education offers a variety of classes, drills, mixers, & private lessons for tennis & pickleball players of all levels. As a public facility, we welcome everyone. Our court fees are a flat rate that include ball machine access & racquet rental at no extra cost! Racquet stringing service is also offered at affordable prices. Every dollar earned on our public courts is poured directly back into our nonprofit program that offers academic support, tennis & athletic enrichment, life skills, family resources & mental health support to K-12 students enrolled in our after school & summer programs. Every time you play tennis or pickleball, you 'play a point' for PT&E students & families
Robert Ringen Hermann, Sr. was an American businessman, soccer executive from St. Louis, Missouri.
The Indianapolis Athletic Club was founded in 1886 and quickly became a premiere private club for Indiana businessmen and society elite. It was especially active in Indiana Democratic politics. Credited with fielding one of the first football teams in Indiana and hosting many of the earliest games, it also promoted baseball and boxing matches. The IAC was a founding member of the Amateur Athletic Union of the United States on January 21, 1888.
Kyle Anthony Hiebert is a Canadian professional soccer player who plays for St. Louis City SC in Major League Soccer and the Canada national team.
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