By MONTE DUTTON

I have known Chuck Waldron since we entered the first grade together. He has heard distant drums – okay, the thump-thump-thump of tennis balls bouncing nearby – for all the years since.

Given his lifelong devotion to tennis, my Clinton High School classmate has been vastly unsung.

Until now.

On Nov. 11 in Charleston, Charles F. Waldron Jr. is to be inducted into the S.C. Tennis Hall of Fame.

Hip, hip, hurray!

Most of the folks who have dedicated themselves to anything as completely as Waldron have made far more money at it. In terms of playing and coaching tennis, he has worked as hard as Tom Brady at football, James Taylor at music or Leonardo DiCaprio at acting.

Now, at last, Waldron is about to be famous because that’s what halls of fame are for.

I do not pretend to be objective. I have been a friend of Chuck Waldron since I learned how to read and his younger brother, Glenn, since I was a teen-ager.

Chuck and I have something in common. Both of us have done exactly what we wanted to do with our lives, and neither of us has placed a particularly high priority on making money.

“That’s life isn’t it? I’ve had plenty of ups and downs as an athlete and a coach,” he said. “I’ve played some of the best players in the world and coached with some of the greatest coaches. I haven’t made a lot of money, but it’s been a wonderful career.”

As Elvis sang, You’ve got to follow that dream wherever that dream may lea-ea-ea-ead-dee-ee-ee-eed …

Before high-school football teams start practicing in earnest, the summer is a blur of routine announcements that deserve mentioning but are hard to turn into a feature, and at this point, I’ve evolved mainly into a writer of features and ballgame stories. Life is a bit less hectic and a lot more fun.

Having worked myself to the point of exhaustion for a modest return, I no longer sweat the small stuff. Now I’m in the business of writing a story when I see a story there.

For instance, I’m excited about the planned renovation of what once was the home of textile baseball in Joanna, but I’m a tad cautious. I’ve been made skeptical by the never-ending process of building a recreation complex in Clinton. I want to see some work underway, but then again, earth was moved at the rec site half a decade ago, and it looked better then than it does now. A huge expanse of red clay is metaphorically a pie in the sky, which I have never seen, either. In 1911, a labor activist named Joe Hill wrote in a song:

There’ll be pie in the sky by and by when I die and it’ll be all right it’ll be all right.

Coincidentally, Hill was executed by a firing squad in 1915.

Lindsey Buckingham wrote:

You can go your own way (go your own way) / You can call it another lonely day.

Chuck’s life in tennis is an epic. James Michener could have written it. David Lean could have directed the movie.

In junior tennis tournaments, from the age of 9 to 17, Chuck lost 234 consecutive matches, and only he would be so meticulous as to know that number. No dog was more dogged than Chuck.

At Clinton High – Guess who his coaches were? Keith Richardson and Andy Young – Chuck played on four state championship teams, one that was runner-up and another that finished third. As you may have ascertained, he started playing in the seventh grade, when he saw no action, and wound up playing No. 1 singles and doubles as a senior.

Inspired by the great Presbyterian College coach, Jim Shakespeare, and by the great player, George Amaya, Chuck went on to play on four teams ranked in the top four in the National Association of Intercollege Athletics, which PC was in before it switched to NCAA Division II and then, sadly, Division I. As a senior, he was the team captain.

If you want to look up the achievements of Amaya and Shakespeare, not to mention Waldron, you’ll have to search the Internet because Presbyterian College no longer documents its sports history before its tumble into Division I in 2007-2008. In effect, the Blue Hose have been falling up a flight of stairs ever since.

Chuck played on a lower pro circuit for 2-1/2 years, then coached at Clemson under Chuck Kriese. Coaching assignments have seldom taken him far from home, though he coached as far away as Salt Lake City, Utah. All three of his children – Virginia, Gracie and Ike – became all-state players at Clinton High. Their father began playing at age 6 and coaching at 15, when Amaya assigned him five young players to develop.

A behind-the-scenes molder of Clinton High’s perennially successful tennis program, he continues to develop young players.

Tennis is a lovely game. Chuck Waldron has made a life of it. Age has not dimmed the sparkles in his eyes.

“I wouldn’t change a thing,” he said.

If you enjoy the way I cover sports and want to help make it better, make a contribution by sending a check to DHK Sports, P.O. Box 768, Clinton, S.C. 29325 or become a patron and make a small monthly donation. It helps indirectly if you buy one of my books at MonteDutton.net.