Two years after the first U.S. Championships at Newport, the Intercollegiate Championships in 1883 and won by Joseph Sill Clark of Harvard in both singles and doubles. Clark, a senior was the Harvard champ that year, feeling justifiably proud of himself because he won the title over classmate Dick Sears, who to be the U.S. champion.

The first Intercollegiates, which Sears did not enter, was played on the grounds of a mental hospital in Hartford, and Clark recalled that some of the patients served as ball boys. Clark, a right-hander, was a Philadelphian, brother of Clarence Clark won the first U.S. doubles title with Fred Taylor. Together he and his brother were a doubles team. They played in England in 1883 after beating the reigning U.S. champs, Sears and Dr. James Dwight, in matches in Boston and New York. They represented the U.S. against the foremost English pair, the Renshaw brothers, Ernest and Willie, in a series for championship. The Renshaws won the two matches played, losing one set in the first.

In 1885 Joe Clark joined Sears to win the U.S. doubles 6-3, 6-0, 6-2, over Henry Slocum and Percy Knapp. Joe was a singles semifinalist 1885, 1886 and 1887, and brother Clarence lost the 1882 final to Sears. Joe ranked in the U.S. five straight years from 1885, No. 4 in 1888. He was born November 30, 1861, in Germantown, PA, entered the Hall of Fame in 1955, and died April 14, 1956. He was president of the USTA 1889-91.