Saratoga News
Style
Photograph by George Sakkestad
John Langley brings a new face to old age. At 92, he still plays competitive tennis three mornings a week at West Valley College.
He may be 92, but Langley can still hold court
Tennis players help with birthday celebration
By Jennifer M. van der Kleut
He's been through a quintuple bypass, suffered two broken wrists and had a tumor on his spine. Most people would think he'd have quit a long time ago, but John Langley keeps coming back--back to the tennis courts.
Seeing one of Langley's thrice-weekly matches, it's not hard to see why. He's got friends there. Lots of friends. Eighteen of them showed up Aug. 18 to celebrate his 92nd birthday.
However, it's not just camaraderie Langley finds on the West Valley College courts, where he has been playing since the 1960s. It's also just a good, old-fashioned love of the game.
Langley was born in Delaware, Ohio, and graduated from high school in 1932. He entered Ohio State University in 1934 to study electrical engineering for three years, eventually switching to business and graduating with a bachelor's degree in 1939.
During the war years, Langley would sit and listen to the radio for hours. He listened intently to broadcasts from England about the German air raids, since American radio magazines never seemed to carry any technical information about the war. Langley enlisted in the Army in Columbus, Ohio, in 1941.
Since he had two years of ROTC in the Army Signal Corps at Ohio State, he was sent to the Signal Corps school at Fort Monmouth. There, he discovered a group of young officers preparing to go to England on a hush-hush project--learning and assisting the British with their radar program, just as he had anticipated. Naturally, Langley applied for the radar program. He became a second lieutenant in November of 1941 and arrived in England the following February.
During World War II, Langley spent two tours in England with the Signal Corps. His first tour was spent learning about and assisting with the British radar program, and the second involved procuring "chaff," or "window," the aluminum foil strips the Air Force used to disrupt German radar screens.
After additional service that took him through Okinawa, Japan, and Colorado Springs, Langley ended up in London once again, where he served as branch chief and coordinating officer of the 3rd U.S. Air Force Command. It was in London that Langley found himself living in a house with a clay court in the backyard. His daughters, around 10 and 11 years old at the time, needed evaluation and lessons, so Langley picked up the tennis racquet he had set down so many years before. He hasn't put it down since.
When Langley retired from the service in 1962 and moved to work for Lockheed Martin in the Bay Area, he sought out the local independent tennis league, which he has been playing ever since.
Now, at 92, Langley's face is a regular sight at the West Valley courts, and his fellow players say it's a welcomed sight, indeed. Despite being the oldest member in the league, Langley can hold his own on the court and others enjoy playing with him.
"He slices that ball, lobs it right over my head, and I'm running as fast as I can to get it," says Mabel Seid, 77, of Saratoga.
Langley is one half of a doubles team with Marianne McDermott of Los Gatos.
"He's a really nice fellow. And we're winning together, believe it or not. He even runs after dead balls, which not many people do. He's unstoppable, an amazing person," says McDermott. "When I'm lazy"--which McDermott says can be often because the games start at 7:30 a.m.--"I just think about John being here, and it gets me up in the morning. And I'm 40 years younger than he is."
It doesn't appear Langley will be giving up the game any time soon. His teammates showed their appreciation with crumbcake and the gift of a new racquet bag at his birthday celebration.
"Why should he? We get to meet girls on the court who otherwise wouldn't give us the time of day," jokes good friend and fellow player Bob Louden, who is 17 years Langley's junior. "If I'm playing tennis as well as he is in 17 years, I'll be happy."
