Fifty Years of Progress 1880-1930

A'THLETlCS I THE SCHOOLS A D UNIVERSITIES the Inter-'Varsity Sports were transferred to Queen's Club, where they remained until 1929. In 1920 the track was reconstructed, the old three laps to the mile being converted to four. In l 894 were inaugurated the meetings with the American U niver– sities, which subsequently played so great a part in Oxford and Cambridge athletics, and proved also the forerunners of the many international con– tests in which those Universities, and their offspring, the Achilles Club, have been pioneers. It was, in fact, through the match between the London A.C. and the New York A.C. in America in 1895, and the matches between Oxford and Yale in London (1894), and Cambridge and Yale in America ( 1895), that the links between the athletes of the two nations were cemented. In their subsequent history these Inter-'Varsity matches assumed a remarkable importance, particularly after the Great War, when they played no mean part in drawing the two nations together. In 1899 a joint Harvard and Yale team visited London and was defeated by Oxford and Cambridge by 5 events to 4; two years later, in New York, the Americans had their revenge, 6-3 ; and they won by the same margin in England in 1904, when their superiority in the sprints and field events outweighed the English strength in the longer distances. After rather a lengthy lapse, Oxford and Cambridge again entertained the Americans in 1911, and won 5-4, taking the sprints for the first time; and since the re-institution of the meetings in 1921 the match has become biennial in each country in turn . At the Harvard Stadium in 1921 the Americans overwhelmed Oxford and Cambridge by 8-2, and seven new records, including a world's record in the long jump, were established. Two years later, at Wembley, Oxford-Cambridge won by 6½-5½, the programme having been enlarged; in 1925, at Harvard, there being a tie on first places, Harvard and Yale obtained the verdict on seconds ; in 1927, at Stamford Bridge, Oxford and Cambridge again proved successful, this time by 7-5; and in 1929, again at Harvard, the Americans won by 8½ events to 3½. Meanwhile, a similar series of matches with Oxford and Cambridge had been inaugurated by Princeton and Cornell. Princeton had beaten Oxford at Queen's Club in 1920 by 6 events to 4; and when the joint Oxford-Cambridge team was in America in the following year they met and tied with a united team from Princeton and Cornell. Four years later, at Atlantic City, the English Universities won somewhat easily by 9¼ events to 2f-; but in 1926, in London, they were successful by the narrower margin of 7-5, whilst in 1929, at Travers Island, New York, Princeton-Cornell turned the tables and won handsomely by 9 events to 3. Allusion should also be made to the Penn relays, at which both Oxford and Cambridge have several times competed with success. The Univer– sity of Pennsylvania was really responsible for the application of the relay idea to amateur athletics, and their famous Inter-Collegiate and Inter– Scholastic relays were first held as long ago as 1895. In 1914 the most 89