Memories of runners who made their name on the racetrack
CARDIFF runners recently celebrated the 50th anniversary of the amalgamation of Roath Harriers and Birchgrove Harriers.
At the celebratory dinner, Bernie Plain – one of five club members to be presented with a Lifetime Achievement Award – showed me a programme for the Sporting Chronicle Carnival, billed as the “Pedestrian Carnival of the Century”.
The event took place on Salford FC Ground at Weaste on Saturday, August 2, and Monday, August 4. Unfortunately it doesn’t say in which year.
There is a reference to “Private Stanton, RAMC winner of the 15 miles Championship at Cardiff, June 26, 1912”, and another to Jack Donaldson holding the professional world record for 220 yards in 1913, so I believe the year to be 1914.
The programme belonged to Bernie’s grandfather and it is interesting to note that a number of athletes from Cardiff were entered for The Chronicle £130 Sprint Handicap.
These were MJ Crowley, FC Davies, and T Andrews, who incidentally was in the same heat as the famed Jack Donaldson of Australia, FC Davies and H Cullum.
Some of these athletes had also entered the 880-yards handicap, and in the 10-miles professional championship Wales was represented by Harry Cullum.
As for Michael “Jake” Crowley, I know that in 1912 he had won the then famous Welsh Powderhall Sprint at Taff Vale Park in Pontypridd.
And in my book The Great Welsh Sprint: The Story of the Welsh Powderhall Handicap 1903-1934, I tell how
Crowley, aged 22, played for Cardiff from 1909-20 and that he had claimed he was more of a middle-distance runner than a sprinter.
In fact, the only race he had won before his great success was a 300-yard handicap some years earlier.
Many years later, he was to claim that he had made the greatest “killing” in the history of the race and that he had embarked on a giant hoodwink that brought him a £900 pay-off – a huge amount back then.
In 1960 he revealed to South Wales Echo reporter Malcolm Lewis that: “I waited nine years for my chance.
“To give the idea that I couldn’t run fast enough, I entered races with a little piece of lead inserted in the sole of my running shoes.
“I also carried a piece in the black belt I wore around my waist.”
The man behind the deception was the famed boxer Peerless Jim Driscoll, who was also a bookmaker at the Powderhall and other sporting events.
Driscoll, who won a huge amount over the event, gave the Cardiff-born Irishman £800 to go with the £140 prize money and a gold watch in gratitude.
The first Cardiffian to win the Welsh Powderhall was AJ Graham, a 19-yearold schoolteacher who had only taken up sprinting six months earlier.
Tommy Oldfield, aged 20, who lived in the Cathays area, was the next Cardiffian to win in 1911 when in a controversial finish he pipped Alec Rowe.
Mike Crowley, already mentioned, was successful in 1912 and the T Andrews referred to was Tommy Andrews, the son of Joseph Andrews of Canton, who won the Welsh Powderhall in 1914.
Pint-sized Pat Barry, aged 26, who won in 1923, told the Echo’s Clive Phillips that he had deliberately lost many races to get a good handicap mark and his supporters backed him early on at odds of 100-1.
In 1924 a grass track was used for the Welsh Powderhall instead of the usual cinders one and the winner was Michael Patrick Herlihy. Like Barry, he was trained by Johhny Mahoney.
Aged 26, Herlihy was one of five children all born of Irish parents in Newtown. Like his brother Dan, who captained Cardiff RFC in 1924, he also played rugby and baseball.
There were two Welsh Powderhall Sprints in 1930.
One was held as usual at Taff Vale Park, which was won by local man Les Thomas, and a breakaway version which was won by Cardiff’s Jackie Munn at Caerphilly’s Virginia Park Stadium.
According to the South Wales Echo, “there were only inches between the four finalists”.
Munn won off 12 and a half yards and any information on him or any of the other athletes mentioned would be welcome.
You can send your letters or pictures to Brian Lee, Cardiff Remembered, South Wales Echo, Six Park Street, Cardiff CF10 1XR or email brianlee4@virginmedia.com – please include your telepone number.