HE WATCHES SPORT WITH EXPERT'S EYE

New Zealand Listener, Volume 1, Issue 12, 15 September 1939, Page 51

HE WATCHES SPORT WITH EXPERT'S EYE

Versatility of E. T. Taylor is Useful to 2YD T. TAYLOR honoured The Listener . Office with a visit this week. At our invitation, let it be said, for "’Tas," if we may so call a solicitor who has the additional claim to fame of being only just married, tends to be a little bashful. However, he objected in vain when the 2YD sports experts combined with The Listener to arrange for his claim to fame to be broadcast to the rest of New Zealand. He had to get into our pages sooner or later. As interviewer for the 2YD Sports Club he has been on the air in the past two and a-half years with more than 300 supercelebrities. Naturally listeners will want to See know just why he has this job to do, and how he does it. So we gave him "the works." When he had reached double figures.in a list of sports in which he had been interested we tried to catch him out and succeeded only in gaining his admission that it had taken a honeymoon and a severe winter to introduce him to snow and ice. Otherwise, so long as a sport has meant a firm grip. of dry land, you may be sure he has tried it at some time. He is, or was, a first class sprinter, and at St. Patrick’s College clocked 10.2 for the 100 yards. He has since cut a fifth of a second of this time, and fears now it is too late to make it round figures. He has also followed with varying keenness, and : . taken an active part in: Tennis, cricket, billiards, soccer, open range rifle shooting and stalking, rowing, golf, amateur boxing, fly fishing, horses, and bowls. In all except one or two of these he has some claim to prominence; but it is with Rugby that his real enthusiasm lies, and nowadays refereeing is almost an obsession. He is instructor for the Wellington Referees’ Association. He snares his celebrities by every known method. Being closely in touch with all sporting developments, he knows exactly who is who and what is what. He meets incoming ships, knows who is on which train, seems to be as familiar with hotel registers as the booking clerks themselves, and at any given minute can go straight to the man he wants,

No ‘scripts are prepared in advance. The work is entirely impromptu, except for ,the usual short conversation beforehand. It. is not an easy: job. Time. spent in finding people and persuading them to speak to listeners is the least onerous part of his duties, even if half a minute on the air may well mean half a day’s work outside. Listeners do not appreciate long silences in conversation. If his celebrity goes dumb the interviewer must keep things going himself. To do this takes a ready wit and very wide knowledge of every possible subject. lalrin. oo He has an autograph book good enough to delight the most hardened celebrity hunter. Some signatures are reproduced here. A quick glance at random through the pages picks up the signatures of: Ray Sheffield (Essex cricketer), Tiger Parke (Californian welter-weight boxer), Tut Coltman (musician-cricketer of Sydney), D. E. Gardiner (British bowling team), Ted Morgan (world welter-weight champion in 1928), Lord Malcolm Douglas-Hamilton (who barrel-rolled off the summit of Mt. Cook down the Hooker Valley to the Hermitage when he visited New Zealand with the touring English Public School Boys), Mrs. Ignacio Martinez (double for Kay Francis), Adrian Quist (Australian Davis Cup tennis player), Morrie Strickland (New Zealand boxer now in England), A. C. Fitch (American Olympic track. athlete), Oldfield (Lancashire cricketer), Barua (Hungarian table tennis player), and dozens ‘of wrestlers, All Blacks, swimmers, yachtsmen, and followers of all kinds of other sports.

He finds the work intensely interesting. There no knowing what he will strike next. From Chi Little Wolf, he had the tallest stories he’d ev: heard. Dick Raines cracked a neat gag that Wellir ton was full of wonderful opportunities-he’d pass seven banks on his way to the studios and none ee them had bars. on the windows; Jack Enwright Auckland swimmer, was his most obliging sportsman to date; and Frank Beaurepaire, Australian Olympic swimmer, his most courteous. One of his most famous was Lord Malcolm Douglas-Hamilton. He was also one of the most silent.