An Athletics Compendium

HowTo UseThis Book Such sitesrepresent a completelynewtypeof resourcewhichthe developmentof the Internet has made possible: where information that it would never have been economic to disseminate in printedform, can be made availablein a structuredway to users,often freeor at lowcost. The last fewyearshaveseenan explosionin the number of web sites offering information on practically every subject in which there is an academic or hobbyist interest. The resources made available by this burgeoning technologyare beyondthe scope of thiscompilation,but the reader'sattention is drawn to Richard Cox's useful, albeit dated. The Internet as a Resource for the Sports Historian (Frodsham:SportsHistoryPublishing,1995). In the main,the entries in this bibliographyarederived from the holdingsof the BritishLibrary(thenationallibraryof the UnitedKingdom),but havebeen considerably enhancedby the compilers' extensiveuseof other publicand private collections.In some instances, however, full bibliographic information has not been available to the compilers.Suchentrieshavebeen includedonly wheretheyhavebeen confident that the itemactually exists,even thoughit hasnot been possibleto obtain full details.Further information on these items, and indeed on any omissions or mistakes in this bibliography,willbe gratefullyreceived by the compilersand incorporated in any future edition. As a specialist subject bibliography. An Athletics Compendium does not include those general referencesources which are to be found in any major reference library. These are no substitutefor a subject's ownspecialistliteraturebut can sometimessupply hard to find or otherwise unavailable information, forexample most titles in the Victoria History of the Countiesof England series havea chapter on sport which may well include references to athletics. Another example would be professional or other directories whichmayinclude elusivebiographicalinformationnot readilyfound elsewhere. Equally, generalindexingand abstractingservicesshouldnot be overlookedfor the materialthey might throw up from journalsin other disciplines. For a similarreason, books on sport in general,or whichcontainonlya sectionor chapter on athletics,are only includedif the compilershave judgedtheir athleticcontent to be of particularsignificance.There isa vast and ever-growingliteratureon sport and sport history,whichincreasingly providestopics for academicstudyand research.Such research is illuminating whole areas of British social history and what has already appearedhas more than proved the worthof such study.However,unlessthe compilers havefelt such items to be particularlyrelevantto the literature of athleticstheyhave been omitted. • Arrangement & Layout The chapter headingsusedreflectthe categoriesto be found in the literatureand it has thus been possibleto listmost items justonce. Wherethe scope of a work cuts across the boundariesof the chapter headings,the book has been listed in the most relevant chapter and indexentries created under all other appropriate headings. In a few cases where it has been judged more helpfulto the user, bookshave been listedin more than one section. [xii]