Vintage 1979 John McEnroe Embossed Stamped Envelope ✉️ First Rookie Masters Win!

Remember John McEnroe's First Masters Title? 🎾 1979 Colgate Grand Prix Masters Cover, John McEnroe's First Masters Title, Madison Square Garden

Size: 6 1/2" x 3 3/4" ~ Unaddressed.

What a comeback! This is a vintage 1979 commemorative cover for the Colgate Grand Prix Masters at Madison Square Garden, a Smith Sports Cachet, never mailed to anybody. On the left, inside a gold embossed border, a color photo of a young John McEnroe in his red headband and a red-and-white shirt. At the upper right, an orange eagle US Postage stamp tied by a round NEW YORK, N.Y. JAN 10 1979 10001 postmark, the opening day of the tournament. And the printed story in the corner tells you why it's worth keeping.

🔍 What's Printed on It

• COLGATE GRAND PRIX MASTERS
• JANUARY 10-14, 1979
• MADISON SQUARE GARDEN
• "JOHN McENROE WON THE GRAND PRIX MASTERS CHAMPIONSHIP AGAINST ARTHUR ASHE, WHO HAD HIM DOWN 4-1 IN THE THIRD SET. HE OVERCAME TWO MATCH POINTS AGAINST HIM TO PULL OUT A 7-5 VICTORY."
• Smith Sports Cachet (in tiny type up the side of the photo)
• A gold embossed shield with a Z

That gold Z shield is the mark of Historic Limited Editions, John Zaso's company, the silk-cachet makers.

🏆 McEnroe vs. Ashe, January 1979

This was the Masters, the year-end championship of the Grand Prix tour. It counted as the 1978 Colgate-Palmolive Masters, the finale of the 1978 season, but it was played at Madison Square Garden from January 10 to 14, 1979. In the final a 19-year-old John McEnroe, in his rookie year as a pro, met Arthur Ashe, and it went down to the wire. McEnroe lost the first set 7-6, won the second 6-3, and fell behind 4-1 in the third, then saved two match points and pulled it out 7-5. It made him the youngest man ever to win the Masters, and it was his first one.

It's a great match-up for a cover like this: the fiery kid from Queens who would go on to be world No. 1 and win seven Grand Slam singles titles, against Arthur Ashe, the first Black man to win the U.S. Open, Wimbledon and the Australian Open, playing in one of the last big finals of his career.

🏡 Display

It's a perfect piece for a tennis fan, a McEnroe or Ashe collector, or anybody who remembers watching tennis in the late '70s, and it looks sharp framed with the Madison Square Garden story showing.