MEMO from the publisher

This Week our Footloose Sportsman and travel editor, Horace Sutton, is in Madrid. There, between overseas assignments for later issues of SPORTS ILLUSTRATED, he is attending the 27th annual convention of the American Society of Travel Agents.

The alliance between sport and travel has always been a natural one and during recent years an increasingly influential reason for people wanting to go from here to there. Sutton's articles in this magazine have not only reflected but also in part contributed to this happy state of affairs.

Even a fractional review of the places Sutton has covered since he attended the last ASTA convention in Chicago a year ago will show you what I mean. There was the Outrigger Club in Honolulu for surfboarding and canoeing (SI, Nov. 12, 1956); Nassau for sports car racing (Dec. 3, 1956); a trip to Havana, among other things a pretty good oasis for frustrated hunters of Caribbean pirate treasure (Jan. 14); Mexico City, where a rarefied atmosphere surrounds bullfighting and jai alai (Jan. 28); Rio, where people race on horses and ski on water (Feb. 11); Austria's Arlberg, where they ski on snow; the Bois de Boulogne, which hides in its green expanse a polo field, race tracks and ponds in which a man can hardly ever catch a fish but can exercise his patience (May 27). There was Toronto, for Canada's "Kentucky Derby," the Queen's Plate (June 10); Denmark, where during Midsummer Week, yachts, bicyclists and jockeys are busting out all over (June 17); and the Adriatic playground (Aug. 26).

For the advocates of America first, Sutton has revealed the Florida Keys for fishermen and sun-bathers (Dec. 17); Tampa Bay, the heartland of baseball's spring training (March 4); Smoke Tree Ranch, hard by Palm Springs, California, complete with bowling green, tennis courts and desert riding (March 18); the Great Smokies, a springtime wonderland for hikers (April 22); St. Louis, for the All-Star Game (July 8); and, to get in the proper swim, Long Island's Hamptons (July 29). Then there was Forest Hills (Sept. 2) for the National Tennis Championships.

To the 2,000 ASTA conventioneers in Madrid, SPORTS ILLUSTRATED has presented a booklet prepared from some other non-Sutton material which has appeared in the magazine. Titled A Spanish Afternoon, it is an introduction to the Spanish national sport of bullfighting, and between its lines it tells, I think, a fascinating story about where sport and travel meet. Just in case you don't happen to be in Madrid right now, if you'll write me, I'll be happy to send you a copy.

ILLUSTRATION