The School Olympics
When the Olympic Games came to London, in 1948, I was still regarded as a small boy, although like many other small boys after the war I was often taken by my father to a variety of sporting events. Athletics, however, due to the distinct lack of betting opportunities, had never grabbed my attention.
Now, fuelled by the ground swell of interest generated by the Olympics, everyone I knew was talking about the popular athletes, MacDonald Bailey, Arthur Wint and, of course, Fanny Blankers-Koen. In fact, every playtime, class relay teams would hurtle their way round our playground, which invariably lead to queues forming outside the First Aid room for attention to grazed knees and elbows.
At this time, the School Sports loomed large in both teachers and pupils consciousness. And although it had crossed my mind, that there might be some betting opportunities, it came as a major disappointment that the only playground events open to my age group, the 11- and 12-year-olds, were to be the egg and spoon, the three-legged race and the sack race. Who were the National Heroes in those, I wondered?
I must have sulked for a week, until Uncle Ernie took the higher ground, ‘Never mind about the betting lad, why don’t you try and win something.’
Truth was, I was a moderate runner, unless someone was chasing me, and my lack of hand-to-eye coordination had cost me dearly at marbles, conkers and shove-ha’penny, so that ruled out the egg and spoon.
My thoughts turned to the sack race, until dad reminded me of my nightly struggle to remain upright whilst climbing into my pyjama trousers – so no go there.
Finally, I settled on the three-legged race, but as Uncle Ernie said, ‘You’ll have to find an agile partner for that one Michael?’ He was right of course and by now I had started to give it serious thought.
The Goldsworth School 12-year-old mixed three-legged race, run over 50 yards, was for 16 boy/girl pairs, to be run in two heats of eight, the first four in each heat to run in the final.
Uncle Ernie, having temporarily given up betting, was keen for me to run and to win and offered me a ten-bob note if I did, later persuading two of his brothers, Albert and Arthur, to
stump up the same amount.
That was all very encouraging, but I still needed a partner. Many of my classmates thinking of entering were planning to run with their boy or girlfriends. So for me, inclined to be a loner, it narrowed the field considerably.
Meantime, using whatever was the 1940s equivalent of positive thinking, I started to consider the ideal type – a girl of the same height and build and, when I really thought about it, a left-footed girl. Her inside-right foot would be tethered to my inside-left foot, so each of us would be leading, in time, with our best foot on the outside, so driving forward our middle-peg.
The chosen object of my desire was Thelma. Bespectacled, she had freckles, a fringe and two short pigtails. But more relevantly, she had been a member of the Junior School Hockey team. So she was both well balanced, agile and the owner of a pair of satisfyingly sturdy legs.
For someone who I had hardly spoken to before, when approached she was surprisingly compliant with my wishes.
The following school lunch break, after adopting a straight-back stance and clasping each other firmly around the waist, we set off in a series of short sprints, up and down, in front of the bicycle sheds.
As we progressed in our training, we began to feel our elevation from ‘bus horses’ to thoroughbreds. This new image was further supported by Thelma’s excellent suggestion that we breathe in unison. At this point, I began to congratulate myself on my inspired choice of partner.
Since playtime was not primarily designed for practising the egg and spoon race – no spare eggs in 1948 – or the sack race – most spare sacks having vanished to reappear on parents’ allotments filled with potatoes – by comparison, the three-legged race seemed ideal. And, when a teachers committee gave permission for prospective entrants to practise in the girls playground, a hitherto gentile hideaway, one could see their progress day by day.
Meanwhile, once again, my reputation had gone before me and I was summoned for questioning by Headmaster ‘Bonk’ Peel.
Marshalling me into his study, he began, ‘Church, I must seriously warn you of the repercussions if you turn our ‘Olympic sports day’ into one of your betting opportunities?’
He sat menacingly on the end of his desk, glowering at me with knitted eyebrows.
‘You remember what happened on our last encounter, when we confiscated your double-headed penny?’
I did indeed, and to reinforce his threat he took one of the five switches from behind his desk, momentarily trying them out for flexibility.
‘I w-wouldn’t dream of it Sir,’ I said with a slight tremble.
He looked past me, my reply having no impact on his impending lecture.
‘By that, I mean no wagering; not sixpences, thrupences or even pennies. Do you understand Church?’ he said, swishing the cane in the metre of his threat.
Fully wound up he continued, ‘The Olympics are a proud occasion for everyone in the British Isles. Remember Church, it’s not about winning, but taking part – right Church?’
‘Right Sir. Permission to speak Sir?’
‘Yes Church.’
‘W-well, to say as yet, I haven’t taken a single bet.’
‘As yet, as yet!’ Peel fumed.
‘Well Sir, I m-meant to add – and I don’t intend to.’
‘I should hope not. Is that a promise Church? You know the consequences.’
‘Alright then, a promise,’ I said, resolutely.
Bonk kept up his frown, but I did hear his secretary, who had crept in midway through his tirade, give a sigh of relief.
Sports day arrived and although the older boys and girls were talking about the hurdles, long jump and discus – the javelin had been passed over as an accident waiting to happen – to the first and second years the games were all about eggs, sacks and three legs.
At that morning’s Assembly, Bonk Peel, not feeling the need for diplomacy, announced that the sports day would open with three ‘novelty events’ for the first and second years. Immediately afterwards, Billy Barker, who later in life worked for a racecourse bookmaker, on hearing of my solemn pledge to Bonk, seized the opportunity to price up all three events.
The egg and spoon was first up. Ten went to post in one heat over 35 yards, girls receiving five yards.
Known at school as the ‘conker kings’, Alfie Parker and Peter Hapgood quickly approached Barker for prices on both little Sammy Marsh and Penelope King. And, as neither were thought to have a serious chance, Barker laid them both 12-1 against, each to the tune of two half-crowns each-way.
Despite the strength of the bets, Barker felt they were tinged with sentiment, Marsh being little more than an errand boy for their shady dealings and Hapgood openly declaring a soft spot for Penny.
Oh, I forgot to tell you that Hapgood’s mother kept chickens and was to supply the fresh eggs for the competition.
Off and running, the bigger boys set the pace, but strangely, around the 25-yard mark, when faced with a head-on wind, most of the front-runners’ eggs rolled off their spoons.
Meanwhile, Sammy King, barely four foot tall, and the pretty Penelope picked their way through the chaotic
scenes of fallen eggs and outbursts of ‘bugger and sod it’ from the first form intake.
Some thought Penelope would have won, but for a sideways glance and wink at Peter, just enough for little Sammy to get up in the final yards to win by a short arm.
There was great applause from Peter and Alfie and, even greater restraint, as they withheld their rush for payment until a less conspicuous moment.
Due to the chaos, an announcement of a ‘stewards enquiry’ called for Miss Sims (domestic science) to examine the eggs. However, her wisdom in giving the all clear after testing the eggs of winner and runner up was sadly misplaced, as later that afternoon, spectators who had the misfortune to tread on the discarded eggs of the losers, noticed their lack of yoke – half the contents having been blown out by a straw!Strangely, all this caused little concern, unlike Headmaster Peel’s reference to the early events as ‘novelty’.“If Bonk wants novelty, we’ll give him bloody novelty”, fumed the first form intake.
Cruelly, Nixon and Janet O’Brien, were both given double homework after coming back late from practising their three-legged technique.
And, as their resentment passed from pupil to pupil, so plans of sabotage began to be hatched; Janet and Colin, who enjoyed a bit of anarchy, nipped out to buy three pounds of over-ripe tomatoes to drop in the bottom of some of the sacks. But the most outrageous rumour going around was that Alfie Parker, whose father was a builder, had been seen knocking up quick-setting cement at the back of the bicycle sheds.
As the competitors waited for the sack race, Hapgood and Parker played their part in the subterfuge, offering their services to give out the sacks and get the runners on their starting positions. Artmaster Norman, who was responsible for this task, welcomed their offer, being only too pleased to have some assistance.
Although always under Bonk’s careful gaze, I was in this case ‘pure as the driven’, but if the rumours were anything to go by, I thought it best to view the race away from those marshalling it.
‘Sack racers get ready,’ boomed Norman through his hand held megaphone, ‘Set – Go!’
Ten bobbing 11-year-old’s bounced up and down in line for about 35 yards, before suddenly, Tommy Smith seemed to skid uncontrollably into Rosie Higgins, bringing her down and two others close behind.
The situation reminded me of Becher’s Brook in those early Grand National newsreels.
Worse was to come when two other boys collided near the line, sliding off into the parents’ deck chairs and scattering tea and biscuits in all directions.
Throughout this gentile mayhem, Janet, Colin and their friends could be seen falling to the ground, helpless with laughter at the success of their dubious intervention.
Four did eventually finish, but such was the noise and distraction that only the participants and one or two of the teacher’s thought there may have been foul play afoot.
Even when Freddie Phillips went up to collect his book token prize, and noticed squashed tomatoes on the soles of his plimsolls, he didn’t think to report it.
Bonk, meanwhile, had gone over to Artmaster Norman to find the reason for so many fallers.
Norman, with an air of great concern, said he would look into all the empty sacks, but by then the Machiavellian pair, Hapgood and Parker, had done away with the evidence.
The three-legged race was next up, and for Thelma and I, this had all the importance of the Cheltenham Gold Cup. But despite being sorely tempted, I stayed true to my promise to Bonk and turned a deaf ear to Barker’s shout of, ‘Four to One the field for the three-legged.’
This was by far the most competitive of the three ‘novelty’ events with 32 runners – 16 pairs – to run in two heats of eight. There were no lanes in this event as the width of the start exceeded the usual boundaries.
I must admit that Thelma and I were nervous; we had put so much thought into our training. I looked around me at the start, keeping a watchful eye on Hapgood and Parker, just in case something was afoot.
‘On your marks – Set – Go!’
We jumped off leading with our outside legs whilst holding each other’s waist tight. Drawn in the middle we encountered bits of bumping; one girl’s shoe came off and another couple’s leg tie came undone. But we kept going to finish second, four yards behind Colin and Janet.
We didn’t stay to watch the second heat, preferring instead to go behind the cricket pavilion and, after taking off the silk scarf that bound our legs we lay flat out on the grass and relaxed. We had made the final!
Ten minutes later, we were tracked down by Thelma’s anxious parents.
There you are. What are you doing down there?’ they echoed.
But I could see the relief on her mother’s face, when she saw we were rubbing the embrocation into our own thighs rather than each other’s!
Mr Norman’s megaphone called us to the start for the three-legged final.
Eight pairs lined up, we were drawn six, Colin and Janet seven.
‘Ready – Set – Go!’ We bounded from the line in unison, for once the whole seeming greater than the sum of the parts.
We were flying and at halfway we led by about two yards. Then, in an effort to storm up our outside, Colin clipped the heel of Thelma, causing her head to go back, then violently forward, sending her glasses flying into our path. I heard the crunch beneath us – it was sickening.
Although Thelma swore and momentarily checked her stride, she kept going with a grim determination – a girl after my own heart.
By now, however, Colin and Janet had taken the lead, but we gave chase, and after a tremendous tussle, joined them right on the line.
After an endless wait for the result, during which Mr Norman consulted three parent judges, he finally announced, ‘After a split decision from our three judges, the result, of a close and dramatic final, goes to…..Colin Nixon and Janet O’Brien.’
Cue some wild cheering from their friends and firm clapping, led by Norman, Bonk and two of the three-strong panel of parent judges.
Thelma and I stood there for a moment in shock, waiting for our minds to catch up with the reality of our disappointment.
Shortly, Thelma’s parents swarmed upon us with, ‘What bad luck dear. Did you think you’d won? Then, Thelma, where are your glasses?’ None of which either of us attempted to answer. And from that moment on, after what had seemed to us as a personal tragedy, our friendship steadily grew.
That evening, Thelma’s parents invited me round for tea, and to give them credit, they never mentioned the likely cost of new glasses once.
Over cream buns and strawberry jam, I realised how lucky I had been to find a girl as committed and obsessional as myself, one in whose company I now no longer stammered.
In the very happy months that followed, whilst guiding her gently through what was for her the unchartered waters of fixed odds football
pools, we became an item, both in the classroom, sitting next to each other for algebra, and out of it, standing behind the goal at Woking.
Twenty years later, at Sir Ivor’s Derby, I thought I saw her in the grandstand. The pigtails had gone, but she still had the glasses and the freckles. I tried to get a closer look, but suddenly, she became engulfed in the crowd, and I could never be sure.
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