Athletics of To-Day 1929

Cross-Country Running 169 judge was, appropriately, Mr. T. Hughes, for no man ever wrote a finer description of cross-country running than that of the Barby Hill run in Tom Brown's School Days. The field numbered twenty-four, with the great W. M. Chinnery at scratch, but he did not start. There were Old Boys of Eton, Rugby and Marlborough, and R. E. Webster, later to become Lord Chief Justice of England. At the cross roads 300 yards from home, eight runner were all bunched together; then King, Webster, happell and Hawtrey, the old Etonian, drew ahead to finish in that order; a yard separated first and second, fifteen yard b tween second and third, and half a yard between third and fourth. The Thames Hare and Hounds lub then came into being; two old Rugbeians, who had made records for the rick and Barby Hill runs, became members, and on October 17th, r 68, the first club run-a paper-chase-was h ld from the King's Head, Roehampton, a quaint old inn, built of wood and ov r hadowed by a mighty wych- lm. The next club to om into being wa the Peckham .A. ., which, long ago, chang d its title to that of the Blackheath Harriers. This was followed, I believe, by the still irr pr ssible South London Harri rs and th partan Harri rs (now d funct, I fancy) of North London, whose v ry n rgetic s er tary, H. M. Oliver, transferred his activities to Birmingham, and had a great deal to do with founding two famous clubs, the Birch– field Harriers and the Mos ley Harrier . Fr m irmingham, liver journey d to London in the summ r of r879 and won the first English Track Steeplechase, running in the colour of th Moseley Harriers. M anwhil the Thames Har and Hounds had contest d two match s with the Gentl m n of Hampst ad in r 70, and th re had b n m ting b tw n t ams of variou clubs right up to r876. In that year the first ational r - ountry hampion– ship was h ld in the wilds of Epping or st. It proved a compl te fiasco, for every on got lost. In th n xt y ar a cour of a out rz miles was plann d from Roehampton ov r Wimbl don ommon past M rton, Mord n,