“ OLD IRON.”

Sun (Auckland), Volume I, Issue 147, 12 September 1927, Page 13

“ OLD IRON.”

PROBLEM OF TROPHIES. AMUSING ENGLISH TALES. The troubles of a sports secretary are by no means over with the distribution of the prizes. Very often they arc only just beginning. One by one the prize-winners seek him out with a request to change the trophies. They have “already won two or three like it.” and the plea is difficult to refuse, writes F. \V. Parker, in the “Athletic News.” When Walter Coad, the cross-country and 10 miles flat champion, was at the top of his form I dropped in, at his little office in the city, to congratulate him on a recent success.

“You know what I got?” lie asked while brewing a cup of tea. “A tantalus spirit stand—the third l*vc won in succession! Rather useful to a total abstainer like myself, isn’t it?" “What have I done with it ? Oh! just pushed it under the bed to keep the other two company.” In those days the idea of attempting to change a prize for “something more useful” never entered an athlete's head. That was an invention of slightly later date. When E. C. Bred in won a scratch half-mile at a Lancashire meeting (Southport, E think) the prize had been given by a very prominent public character. It was said to have cost £25, sufficient to have purchased a handsome challenge cup of solid silver, but the donor had preferred to spend it on a plated cup. The result was a huge trophy that, as one onlooker remarked: “With a hit o’ ornamental stonework round the fut, what a nobby christenin' font for a parson.” Haif-Hur.dredweight Haul.

As became a one-time member of that famous body the North-West Mounted Police, Bredin was never afraid to express an opinion, and his comments on the generous donor were rather caustic. In a modern flat the cumbersome cup was almost literally a “white elephant.” But it had its uses. At first as a sort of laundry receiv-ing-office—for soiled linen “Now, you see,” said Bredin “I use it as a wastepaper basket. What else ran I do with the thing?” he asked me, with an expressive shrug. Coming away from the Oval one very warm afternoon —it would be somewhere between the two incidents I have described—l encountered Sid. Thomas. He had enjoyed an unusually successful afternoon.

Resting at his feet were his trophies: one handsome and exceedingly massive marble clock, with bronze side ornaments, and one pair of hefty figures cf similar metal.

Someone had helped him so far on the journey, and he begged me to lend him a hand with “this hundred-weight of ironmongery.” The Boy Scouts were neither horn nor thought of in those days, but alvrays willing to do the day’s good turn I lifted a fair half of the impedimenta vrithoiit ado. With occasional rests we reached the centre of Vauxhall Bridge, where we paused to wipe perspiring brows ami rest aching arms. “Warm work, isn’t it?” asked Sid. Rather a needless question, I thought—or in the words of Sam Weller, it was “a self-evident proposition.” Into the Thames? Thomas ruminated to the effect that his father would probably only grumble at “more lumber” being taken home. He looked over the parapet. Our eyes met. A slow grin, and a look of interrogation passed! over Sid’s face. It certainly was an excessively warm day, and the weight of those prizes had surely doubled. I, too, looked down into the river. A penny steamer, fully crowded, was approaching the bridge: several rowing boats and a couple of barges with men toiling at the sweeps were in the near vicinity. I shook my head, firmly. “No. Sid: manslaughter’s a nasty charge io face: come along 1” We resumed our burdens. It is strange how certain little incidents will often recall almost forgotten episodes of the long ago. A full score of years later, on a. verv much hotter day, I met, at the back of the Stockholm Olympic Games Stadium. V. J. Woodward and other members of England’s victorious football team literally bending under the weight of the magnificent trophy just received from the Swedish King. This was certainly the finest, and the heaviest prize I have ever seen. Even while admiring it, and offering the usual congratulations, my mind was running back to the adventure with Sid Thomas, his “ironmongery.” and th'* might-have-been tragedy of Vauxhall Bridge. Suita and Land. At a certain sports meeting at the old Stamford Bridge there were some decidedly novel prizes. For a two miles race the chief prize was described as “a freehold plot of land at a rising seaside resort.” It was a good many years ago, and possibly the resort has duly risen. But each time I inquired, at longish intervals, from the fortunate winner. I was informed that the only signs of anything rising about the plot was an annual crop of weeds. Another race that day was won by an athlete now holding a very prominent position in League football. He had it deserved reputation for a na :ty and well-tailored appearance. His prize was a ready-made suit presented by a local tailor. Imagine the picture: Walking up to the prize table, clad in a silk-faced frock coat, tall hat in hand, to receive a roughly tied brown paper parcel containing a cheap suit of “slops.” Receiving the prize with a formal bow, the winner immediately dropped it, either by accident or design. But he left it where it fell!

The unicorn fish is found off the coasts of the West Indies, and is so called because of the curious little horn which protrudes from between its eyes. « * * The Surname Napier comen from nappe, cloth, and a nappier was the servant who looked after the napery, or house linen, in the house of his lord. * * * A popular occupation among the Congo natives is catching baby elephants to be trained as porters at a special school. The hunters carry them off bodily.