Word: jeane
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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...annual bullfight-for-fun fiesta in the southern French town of Vallauris, famed Painter Pablo Picasso, topped off by a matador's hat, cheered the festivities with his old friend, France's oddball Poet-Playwright Jean Cocteau. Because French tradition opposes bullfighters actually killing their beasts, Vallauris was deathless, but Spanish-born Aficionado Picasso seemed to enjoy the fray just as much as if the arena were awash with gore...
...Saint-Jean-de-Luz, spectators ignored a broiling sun and crowded the town fronton, as the pelota court is called. Kids clambered in the branches of chest nut trees to get a better view. This was the biggest pelota game of all: the championship match between a team led by Basque Idol Jean Urruty and a team headed by his closest competitor, Spanish Champion Valentin Careaga...
Swift Skill. Slim and lively as a weasel for all his 40 years, Jean Urruty is a past master at grand chistera. Next to the husky Spaniards in their rose-colored shirts, Urruty and his teammates looked a little too frail for so tough a game, but the very first serve dispelled any Basque doubts. Urruty bounced the pelota, caught it in his chistera and slung it against the wall with whiplash speed. There was a sharp, dry crack, and the ball had bounced back 60 yards. The Spaniards were already on the defensive...
Such swift skill is the product of long practice. As a ten-year-old choir boy in the tiny Basque town of Saint-Palais, Jean Urruty was already a promising pelotari. Sunday mornings, after Mass, his priest would take him to the local court for an hour-long workout at main nue. At 14, he quit school to become a carpenter's apprentice, but his heart was still at the fronton. French Tennis Champion Jean ("The Bounding Basque") Borotra, a fine pelotari himself, took the youngster under his wing, brought him to Paris and taught him tennis. Urruty...
...Urruty's soft drop shots fell just out of reach; his low returns were unplayable. After two hours and 54 minutes of the murderous pace, the groggy Spaniards were thoroughly beaten, 60-50. Jean Urruty and his team were pelota champions of the world...