Behr, Karl

Karl Howell Behr
Born: May 30, 1885
Died: October 15, 1949
Hometown: Brooklyn, New York, United States
Citizenship: United States
Handed: Right
Inducted: 1969

Grand Slam Record
 Wimbledon Doubles finalist 1907

Tournament Record
Davis Cup Team Member 1907

 Intercollegiate Doubles 1904

Other
Titanic Survivor

A Yale man, Karl Howell Behr won the U.S. Intercollegiate doubles in 1904, and played on the 1907 U.S. Davis Cup team. Behr, a 5-foot-91/2 inch, 155-pound survivor of the Titanic sinking in 1912, forever considered himself a lucky man. But he didn’t have much good fortune in his lone Cup assignment, with Beals Wright, against Australia, a 3-2 defeat at Wimbledon in 1907. He lost a toughie to Tony Wilding the first day, 1-6, 6-3, 3-6, 7-5, 6-3, dropping the last four games, and the clincher to Norman Brookes, 4-6, 6-4, 61, 6-2. But he and Wright did prolong it to the third day with a stirring doubles victory over Wimbledon champs Brookes-Wilding, 3-6, 12-10, 4-6, 6-2, 6-3. Brookes and Wilding proceeded to take the Cup from Britain, 3-2. Playing Wimbledon that year, Behr made one of the better American showings of that early time, reaching the fourth round where he gave the champ, Brooks, a stiff fight, 6-4, 6-2, 2-6, 3-6, 6-1.

He ranked in the U.S. Top Ten seven times between 1906 and 1915, No. 3 in 1907, and again in 1914 when he beat future champ Lindley Murray, 3-6, 6-2, 7-5, 3-6, 8-6, to reach the quarters in the U.S. Championships at Newport. There he lost to the champion-to-be, Dick Williams, 6-2, 6-2, 7-5, in a battle of Titanic alumni. In 1906, ranked No. 11, Behr had jolted an all-time champ, No. 3 Bill Larned, in the second round, 6-4, 6-4, 7-5, and fought past No. 9 Raymond Little, 2-6, 6-2, 6-8, 11-9, 6-4, to the final of the allcomers, where Bill Clothier, en route to the championship, stopped him, 6-2, 6-4, 6-2. He was a semifinalist in 1912, losing to Wallace Johnson, 4-6, 6-0, 6-3, 6-2. Behr, a right-hander, was born May 30, 1885, in Brooklyn, NY, and died October 15, 1949, in New York. He entered the Hall of Fame in 1969.

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