Fifty Years of Progress 1880-1930

ATHLETICS IN THE MIDLANDS to transact necessary business. The minutes of the previous meetings having been confirmed, Mr. John Anderton (Birmingham A.C.) was elected President; Messrs. H. W. Wheeler and Dr. J. W. Moore (Moseley H.), Vice-presidents; Messrs. F. Smith (Birmingham A.C.) and H. M. Oliver (Moseley H.), Joint Hon. Secretaries; and Mr. E. B. Holmes (Moseley F.C.), Hon. Treasurer. It is important to note that at this meeting a circular was read from Mr. B. R. Wise (President of the Oxford University A.C.), asking the Midland Association to send representatives to the meeting to be held at Oxford, and Messrs. J. Anderton and Frank Smith were deputed to attend. This was the A.A.A. formation meeting, held at the Randolph Hotel, Oxford, on Saturday, April 24th, r 880. Mr. John Anderton was elected a Member of the first General Committee at this meeting, and it was agreed, on the proposition ofMr. Frank Smith, that the Championship Meeting of r 88 r should be held in Birmingham, the Northern representa– tives offering no opposition. The Midland Association was particularly active in its first year. It dealt with cyclists and swimmers as well as pedestrians ; at least, one of its decisions-relating to a cyclist-aroused considerable dissent, and Mr. Frank Smith tendered his resignation, but was prevailed upon not to press it. The Association, however, presented a bold front, and its use– fulness being undoubted, it grew in strength and influence, and has never looked back. The first annual general meeting was held in Birmingham on March 24th, 1881, at the Midland Hotel, the President, Mr. John Anderton, occupying the chair, and fourteen clubs being represented. Its financial statement recorded an income of £14 14s. and an expenditure of £r6 r 8s. 3d., the deficit being due to the fact that £6 had been paid to the A.A.A. as the Midland Association's share of the loss sustained on the Championship Meeting of 1880. The item was made up of a levy of 30s. on each of the four votes which the Association exercised. Mr. John Anderton was re-elected President; Messrs. Frank Smith and H. M. Oliver, Joint Hon. Secretaries; Mr. E. B. Holmes, Hon. Trea– surer; and Messrs. John Anderton, Frank Smith, T. T. Prime, and D. Davis were chosen as representatives on the A.A.A. In this article it is impossible to do more than briefly relate the story of the Association's birth and its earliest steps towards achieving its present authoritative and useful position ; but reference must be made to the Championship Meeting of I 88 I-the first held in the provinces-and which may fairly be said to have achieved a success that was really wonderful. It had first been agreed that this Meeting should be held at the grounds of the Birmingham A.C., at Portland Road, Edgbaston, to which there was considerable opposition, however, and eventually the venue was changed-not because of the opposition, but by force of circumstances– to the Aston Lower Grounds. There a new cinder path of 501 yards 69