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Abstract
Focusing on four awards, the Sporting Record/Daily Express ‘Sportsman/Sportswoman of the Year’, the ‘Footballer of the Year’, the Sportswriters's ‘Sportsman/Sportswoman of the Year’ and the BBC's ‘Sports Personality of the Year’, this study examines the general factors impacting upon the establishment of a sporting ‘honours system’ in the 1940s and the specific commercial and political reasons behind the foundation of these individual awards. It argues that while such awards can have an ‘objective’ value in helping us identify contemporary sporting pantheons, they are best seen as cultural rituals designed to elevate particular models of sporting behaviour, encourage a belief in the expert status of sports journalists, and to allow sporting stars and the sports media to show themselves to the public in the kindest possible light.
Notes
1. A section of this article was presented to the 2007 ‘Historians on Sport’ conference at De Montfort University. I am grateful to participants for their comments, and especially so to Huw Richards. I am grateful to Louise North of the BBC Written Archives Centre, Caversham, for her considerable help with sources.
2. Similar national awards were founded within Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales but they are not considered here.
3. Wisden cricketers’ almanack, 144th edition (2007), p. 84. In fact, the first listing was for the six bowlers of the year and the second for the nine batsmen of 1890. It settled on five in 1891, with wicket-keepers the chosen category.
4. I am extremely grateful to Alexander Jackson for material on Gamages.
5. Sporting Record, 5 Feb. 1949.
6. From http://www.footy.com.au/dags/FAQ4v1-5.html#Section5.0, accessed, 26 Apr. 2009.
7. From http://www.abae.co.uk/International/Senior/Olympic/valbarker/index.asp, accessed, 10 June 2008.
8. R. Osborne, 75 years of the Oscar. The official history of the academy award (New York, 2003), p. 15.
9. Les Hoole, The rugby league challenge cup. An illustrated history (Derby, 1998), p. 202; Graham Morris, Hero. Rugby league's greatest award winners (Skipton, 2005), p. 8.
10. Richard Holt and Tony Mason, Sport in Britain, 1945–2000 (Oxford, 2000), pp. 3–4, 64. More generally, David Kynaston, Austerity Britain, 1945–51 (London, 2007).
11. Joyce Woolridge, ‘These sporting lives: Football autobiographies, 1945–1980’, Sport in History, 28 (4) (2008), pp. 620–40; Dave Russell, ‘ “Interesting and instructive reading”? The FA book for boys and the culture of boyhood, 1945–1973’, Journal of Sport History, 34 (1) (2007), pp. 231–52.
12. Sporting Record, 7 Jan. 1947. Unfortunately, copies of the paper in which the competition was launched in late 1946 were not available for consultation at the time of research.
13. Sporting Record, 7 Jan. 1947. Unfortunately, copies of the paper in which the competition was launched in late 1946 were not available for consultation at the time of research. 5 Feb. 1947, 18 Dec. 1954, 8 Jan. 1955.
14. Sporting Record, 7 Jan. 1947. Unfortunately, copies of the paper in which the competition was launched in late 1946 were not available for consultation at the time of research. 9 Feb. 1952.
15. Sporting Record, 7 Jan. 1947. Unfortunately, copies of the paper in which the competition was launched in late 1946 were not available for consultation at the time of research. 29 Jan. 1949, 17 Dec. 1947, 15 Jan. 1949.
16. Sporting Record, 7 Jan. 1947. Unfortunately, copies of the paper in which the competition was launched in late 1946 were not available for consultation at the time of research. 10 Feb. 1950, 30 Jan. 1954, 8 Jan. 1955.
17. Sporting Record, 7 Jan. 1947. Unfortunately, copies of the paper in which the competition was launched in late 1946 were not available for consultation at the time of research. 17 Nov. 1956.
18. Daily Express, 11 Dec. 1958.
19. Steve Rider with Martyn Smith, BBC sports personality of the year (London, 2003), p. 8.
20. See especially A. Briggs, The history of broadcasting in the United Kingdom, vol. 4: Sound and vision (Oxford, 1979).
21. Memo, Fox to Dimmock, 4 Oct. 1954. See also memo from Dimmock to either Television Publicity Officer or Programme Organiser Television, 8 Oct. 1954. BBC Written Archive Centre [afterwards, BBC WAC], T14/1190/2.
22. Rider and Smith, BBC sports personality, p. 11.
23. Memo, Fox to Dimmock, 9 Nov. 1954, BBC WAC, T14/1190/2.
24. Rider and Smith, BBC sports personality, p. 34. For the code, Dimmock to General Manager of Sporting Record, 12 Dec. 1955, BBC WAC, T14/1187/20.
25. Undated press release, BBC WAC, T14/1799/5.
26. Handwritten tabulation, BBC WAC, T14/1799/5.
27. Briggs, Sound and Vision, p. 776. Memo, Fox to Dimmock, 8 Nov. 1954, BBC WAC, T14/1190/2; see for example, Sportsview scripts 2 Nov., 16 Nov. 1955, BBC WAC, T14/1187/19.
28. Cricinfo; Graham Selkirk, ‘The story behind the footballer of the year’, FA Book for Boys, 10 (1957–8), pp. 88–93.
29. David Hunn, 50 years of the Sports Writers’ Association of Great Britain (London, 1998), p. 2. It changed its name to the Sports Journalists’ Association in 2002, following a merger with the Professional Sports Photographers’ Association.
30. Selkirk, ‘Story’, p. 88.
31. Hunn, 50 years, p. 3.
32. Selkirk, ‘Footballer of the year’, p. 90.
33. David Hunn, 50 years, p. 5. I am extremely grateful to the SWA for making a copy of this invaluable booklet available to me.
34. Selkirk, ‘Story’, p. 89.
35. Selkirk, ‘Story’, pp. 31–3.
36. Woolridge, ‘These sporting lives’, p. 626. See also her ‘From local hero to national star? The changing cultural representation of the professional footballer in England, 1945–1985’ (unpublished PhD thesis, University of Central Lancashire, 2007), ch. 3.
37. Sporting Chronicle, 26 Apr. 1948, 1 Apr. 1949; Daily Mail, 3 Apr. 1951.
38. Daily Mail, 3 Apr. 1951.
39. Although he had led the unfashionable club to the FA Cup Final.
40. Selkirk, ‘Story’, p. 90.
41. Alan Rowlands, Trautmann. The Biography (Derby, 1990), p. 170.
42. Rowlands, Trautmann pp. 155, 169; Manchester Evening Chronicle, 24, 26 Mar. 1956.
43. Brian Belton, The battle of Montevideo. Celtic under siege (Stroud, 2008).
44. Hunn, 50 Years, p. 8.
45. Daily Express, 2 Dec. 1970.
46. Don Revie, Soccer's happy wanderer (London, 1955), p. 93.
47. Cycling, 23 Dec. 1967.
48. Nat Lofthouse, Goals galore (London, 1954), pp. 108–9.
49. Bert Trautmann, Steppes to Wembley (London, 1956), pp. 129–30; Gordon Banks, Banksy. My autobiography (London, 2002). Banks was elected in 1972.
50. Sporting Record, 15 Feb. 1949.
51. Daily Express, 9 Nov. 1960, 25 Nov. 1969.
52. Daily Express, 12 Feb. 1947, 28 May 1949.
53. Sporting Record, 8 Apr. 1950.
54. Lofthouse, Goals, pp. 108–9.
55. Daily Express, 10 Jan. 1957.
56. Daily Express, 8 Apr. 1950.
57. Daily Express, 12 Dec. 1957.
58. Daily Express, 30 Dec. 1957. Gordon Pirie, Running wild (London, 1962). Pirie was gracious to the winner, athlete John Disley, and argued that boxer Don Cockell had also been unfairly ignored.
59. Daily Express, 30 Dec. 1957. Gordon Pirie, Running wild (London, 1962). Pirie was gracious to the winner, athlete John Disley, and argued that boxer Don Cockell had also been unfairly ignored. 7 Jan. 1957.
60. Daily Mirror, 29 Dec. 1957.
61. Daily Express, 30 Dec. 1957.
62. Daily Telegraph, 13 Dec. 1978; Daily Mirror, 13, 14 Dec. 1978; Guardian, 13 Dec. 1978. Like Pirie, he found much press criticism unhelpful and clashed with journalists on a number of occasions.
63. Gary Whannel, Media sport stars: Masculinities and moralities (London, 2001).
64. For example, A. Jackson, ‘The Baines Card and its place in boys’ popular culture between 1887 and 1922’, in Bob Snape and Helen Pusard, eds, Recording leisure lives: Histories, archives and memories of leisure (Brighton, 2008), pp. 47–72; Joyce Woolridge, ‘Mapping the stars: Stardom in English professional football, 1890–1946’, Soccer and society, 3 (2) (2002), pp. 51–69; Mike Huggins and Jack Williams, Sport and the English, 1918–1939 (Abingdon, 2006), pp. 42–59.
65. Selkirk, ‘Story’, p. 92.
66. Sporting Record, 22 Jan. 1947. Even hurdler Maureen Gardner, fourth overall in 1949, gained less than 5%. Martin Polley, Moving the goalposts. A history of sport and society since 1945 (London, 1998), p. 92.
67. Hunn, 50 years, pp. 15–16.
68. Sporting Record, 8 Jan. 1955; Daily Express, 11 Dec. 1958, 11 Dec. 1959.
69. Sporting Record, 4 Feb. 1950.
70. Sporting Record, 8 Jan. 1947.
71. Memo from Dimmock to either Television Publicity Officer or Programme Organiser Television, 8 Oct. 1954, BBC WAC, T14/1190/2.
72. Holt and Mason, Sport in Britain, p. 46.
73. For a scathing view of the BBC event, Kevin Mitchell, ‘Sue and Gary the only equals in the blandest show on earth’, Observer, 9 Nov. 2008.
74. Guardian, 12 Oct. 2007.