US Open
It is listed next to three other major tennis events in the world, as the coveted goal of champion and aspiring tennis players. The US Open started off as an amateur event known as the US National Championships back in 1881. That event was held at the Newport Casino in Rhode Island, where it remained for 34 years. The U.S. National Singles Championship for men, which would eventually become the US tennis Open, was only for men of the United States National Lawn Tennis Association.
In 1900, the U.S. National Men’s Doubles Championship was sectioned out into East and West. Then there was a championship of the winners of each section. Over a decade beforehand, in 1887, the first ever U.S. Women’s National Singles Championship was held at the Philadelphia Cricket Club. Beginning in 1921, mixed doubles was combined with the men’s doubles program of the U.S. National Championships. The event officially became the US Tennis Open in 1968 bringing together five major US National Championships into one event. The US Open started at the West Side Tennis Club in Forest Hills, Queens, N.Y. with a total of $100,000 being offered to 96 men and 63 women who participated. Today, the US Open offers more than $16million to more than 600 men and women.