Athletics of To-Day 1929

The Growth of Modern Athletics 7 other contributory factors. One was the institution of the Volunteer movement ; another was the increasing pressure of professional and business life and the over-crowding of people in towns, which led to a craving for freedom from constriction both in space and clothing, accompanied by violent exercise. Apart from the Necton Guild and the probable Sandhurst Sports already mentioned, I think the credit for instituting proper athletic meetings must be shared between some of our great public schools, th'e Royal Military Academy, Woolwich, and Exeter College, Oxford. The famous "Crick Run" at Rugby appears to have been founded in r837, and in the same year there were hurdle races at most of the tutors' and dames' houses at Eton, a hundred yards over ten flights of hurdles being the usual course. Shrewsbury followed hard on Rugby in instituting a st eple– chase, and in r845 Eton had a similar event and, in addition, Sprint races and hurdle races, which were decided on the road, all on different days. I? r849 the Royal Military Academy, Woolwich, set an enhr ly new fashion by holding a properly organized sports meeting for the "gentleman-cadets," in the course of which a thoroughly compr hensive programme was d cided. In the following year aptain Eardley-Wilmot presented a silver bugle to be h ld for one year by the winner of the great st number of vents at " The Shop " sports. That bugle, prob.ably the first amateur athletic challenge trophy ever pr nt d, has long since become cov red with the names of lt holders, and the custom now is to attach to it each year a srnaU silver medal which bears the winner's name. It is of int r t to note that the records of the Royal Military Academy relat that the first winner of the bugle "wa a ornishman of v ry short stature, but square as a tower and of very great str ngth. On joining he threw in wrestling all the strongest cadets, and before h left he jumped more than his own height." Mr. J H. A. R ay, L.A.C., who won the English rzo Yards Hurdles hampionship, r877, in r7J secs., but whose m rnory goes back further still, has some vivid recollections