Australia’s first Olympic champion ‘every inch a gentleman’
Remembering our Olympians: Edwin Flack, Greece 1896.
EDWIN HAROLD FLACK: 1873 - 1935
Edwin Flack, the Melbourne businessman who passed away on Thursday, January 10, 1935, in a private hospital, was very prominent in sport years ago. He was the first Australian winner at the Olympic Games. These took place in Athens in 1896, where Mr Flack won the 800 and 1500 metres championships and also started in the Olympic Marathon.
Athlete and Olympian Edwin Flack.Credit: State Library NSW
The outstanding mile runner of his period in Australia, he won championships of Australasia, New South Wales, and Victoria, besides the two miles championships in New South Wales and Victoria, and many other important events. Richard Coombes, the archpriest of amateur athletics in Australia, and a very fine judge, had great admiration for Flack as a man with a high sense of sportsmanship.
In 1894 after Flack had won the Victorian cross-country championship of 10 miles in 60 min 2sec, Coombes, in his “Referee” notes, wrote: “Mr Flack, who is known on this side of the Murray as well as in Victoria, is an Englishman, but he has lived for a number of years in Melbourne, where he is a great favourite...he is a young athlete of modest demeanour, and every inch a gentleman. His action is very taking, and his long sweeping strides particularly telling.”
In one of his letters from Europe immediately after the Olympic Games, Mr Flack paid a tribute to the Royal family of Greece, the King and Queen and three princes, for the personal and practical interest they had shown in the Games.
Prince George, who acted as starter throughout, was a man of very striking appearance, standing 6ft 3in and weighing 18 stone. The winners at Athens, in the Olympic events, each received a branch of olives, a handsome diploma detailing the success, and a silver medal, commemorative of the race. Mr Flack was twice honoured in this way.
The Herald report on 1896 of Edwin Flack’s Olympic victory.Credit: Fairfax
In the marathon he had worked into the lead early, but as he had not trained for this sort of race over rough country and a long distance, his legs went back on him, and he had to finally withdraw.
Mr Flack was an old Melburnian, aged 61, a bachelor and a member of the firm of Flack and Flack, accountants and auditors. He was a director of several companies including Robert Harper and Co., and Howard Smith and Co.
Two years after the Games, Mr Flack gave an interesting account of the Olympic gathering and of the enormous interest it created in Greece.
The object of the promoters was to bring together the world’s best amateur athletes (professionals were excluded), and a vast stadium was erected on the site of the ancient stadium.
The start of the 100 metres final at Athens in 1896. The competitor second from the left, T.E. Burke (USA), who adopted the crouch, was the winner.Credit: Fairfax
Some idea of the magnitude of the structure may be formed from the fact that when finished it will accommodate between seventy and eighty thousand persons. Athletes from all quarters of the globe were among the competitors, and the Greeks, as in the prehistoric days, abandoned themselves to the great occasion.
Asked whether the Greeks still retain the prowess which distinguished the race in ancient times, Mr Flack smiled, and said: “No, they are very poor athletes, and were beaten in all the competitions save one, the run from Marathon to Athens, 25miles.”
Did you train for the games? “No; but I was never in better form, and had rather an easy victory in the 800 metres race. In the 1500 metres race the task was not so easy, and I had some fear about beating the American. A representative of France led for a considerable distance. To make the pace stronger I had to join the Frenchman, and we ran together for a lap or two,” he said.
“The vast gathering became furiously enthusiastic, and when the American, who had been following closely in our wake, got on terms in the last lap and the Frenchman dropped back, the real struggle began. It was a long straight, and a bitter fight for supremacy. The American failed to stay it out, and I won rather easily in the final 50 yards.”
Opening Ceremony, Athens Olympic Games 1896.Credit: Source unknown
Did you compete in any other event? “Yes. I was among the competitors in the road race from Marathon to Athens. This event created extraordinary interest, and the Greeks had set their hearts on winning it. On the previous night prayers were offered in the churches for the success of the Greek competitors, and one of their number (who proved the winner) visited the church on the morning of the race and prayed for victory. The streets were lined and the road between the two points was thronged for miles,” Mr Flack said.
“Over 200,000 excited people had gathered along the route and at the finishing point. It was not money that created the interest. There was no betting ,and the prizes were medals and diplomas and the much-coveted laurel. It was a feeling of patriotism which had seized all classes, rich and poor alike, of both sexes.”
Mr Flack was in front two miles from Athens, but he collapsed at that point, and the powerful Greek struggled on gallantly to the end, and in the eyes of his compatriots immortalised himself by getting the judge’s verdict. When the Greek was proclaimed victor there was a deafening outburst of enthusiasm, which lasted for some minutes.
A statue of Australia’s first Olympic winner Edwin Flack looks over the shoulder of torch-bearer Alain Cerdor before the Sydney 2000 Olympics.Credit: Fairfax
“It was really the best thing that could have happened. That victory had put the coping stone of success on the big gathering, and the representatives of other nations were treated with regal hospitality afterwards.”
What were the prizes? “Very handsome and neatly inscribed silver medals, large and very beautiful ‘diplomas,’ and the real laurel, than which nothing is more prized.”
Compiled from reports on Trove.
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