Edwin Harold Flack (5 November 1873 – 10 January 1935) was an Australian athlete and

tennis Tennis is a racket sport that is played either individually against a single opponent (singles) or between two teams of two players each (doubles). Each player uses a tennis racket that is strung with cord to strike a hollow rubber ball cov ...

player. Also known as "Teddy", he was Australia's first Olympian, being its only representative in 1896, and the first Olympic champion in the 800 metres and the 1500 metres running events. Following Flack's Olympic appearance, he did not compete in any large events again, opting to breed cattle and help his family's accounting firm. Flack died aged 61 following an operation, and was buried in his hometown of Berwick. He is commemorated there by a bronze statue on High Street and a reserve which includes several sporting grounds. Flack was also inducted into the

Sport Australia The Australian Sports Commission (ASC) is the Australian Government commission responsible for supporting and investing in sport in Australia. The Commission incorporates the Australian Institute of Sport. From 2018 to 2022, it was known as S ...

and

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halls of fame in 1985 and 2000, respectively.

Early life

Born in London, England, Edwin Flack was five years old when his family migrated to Australia, to live in

Berwick, Victoria Berwick () is a suburb in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia, south-east of Melbourne's central business district, located within the City of Casey local government area. Berwick recorded a population of 50,298 at the 2021 census. It was nam ...

. Soon after leaving the

Melbourne Church of England Grammar School (Pray and Work) , established = 1849 (on present site since 1858 - the celebrated date of foundation) , type = Independent, co-educational primary, single-sex boys secondary, day and boarding , denomination ...

in 1892, where he studied

Greek history The history of Greece encompasses the history of the territory of the modern nation-state of Greece as well as that of the Greek people and the areas they inhabited and ruled historically. The scope of Greek habitation and rule has varied throu ...

, Flack joined his father's accountancy firm, Davey, Flack & Co. From 1892 to 1894, Flack was active in middle and long-distance running in amateur athletics in the then colony of Victoria, competing with the Melburnian Hare & Hounds athletics club. In October 1892 he placed third in the inaugural Victorian 10-mile cross country championship, held at Oakleigh (Park) Racecourse, in a time of 1:02.42.0. On 9 to 11 November 1893, an intercolonial meet described as the

Australasian Championships The Australian Open is a tennis tournament held annually at Melbourne Park in Melbourne, Australia. The tournament is the first of the four Grand Slam tennis events held each year, preceding the French Open, Wimbledon, and the US Open. ...

was held at the

Melbourne Cricket Ground The Melbourne Cricket Ground (MCG), also known locally as "The 'G", is an Australian sports stadium located in Yarra Park, Melbourne, Victoria. Founded and managed by the Melbourne Cricket Club, it is the largest stadium in the Southern ...

, between athletes from the British colonies that were later to form the nations of Australia and New Zealand. This was the second such meet, the first having been held at Moore Park in Sydney on 31 May 1890. Flack competed in the 1893 event and won the mile championship in a time of 4:44.0, with a winning margin of two yards. He also competed in the 880 yards (won by Ken McCrae of New South Wales in 2:06.8) and three miles championship (won by Charles Herbert of Victoria in 15:33.6), but was unplaced in both events. By virtue of his win in the mile event he was also awarded the Victorian 1893 mile championship title and, on 30 September 1893, was third in the Victorian 10 mile cross country championship in a time of 1:05.21. On 15 December 1894, Flack won both the 880 yards (2:07.2) and mile (4:49.4) Victorian 1894 championships and, earlier in the year, on 22 September 1894 was second in the 10-mile cross country championship (1:00.02). The 1894 event was Flack's last appearance in the Victorian Championships. The same year, Flack was sent to London to receive further training as an accountant with the firm Price, Waterhouse & Co (now

PricewaterhouseCoopers PricewaterhouseCoopers is an international professional services brand of firms, operating as partnerships under the PwC brand. It is the second-largest professional services network in the world and is considered one of the Big Four accounti ...

). Flack joined the London Athletic Club and was intent on attending the coming inaugural Olympics. Flack attended the Olympics as a member of the London Athletic Club, but competed in his Melburnian Hare and Hounds colours.

1896 Olympics

Flack reached

Athens Athens ( ; el, Αθήνα, Athína ; grc, Ἀθῆναι, Athênai (pl.) ) is both the capital and largest city of Greece. With a population close to four million, it is also the seventh largest city in the European Union. Athens dominates a ...

after an uncomfortable six-day rail and sea trip, during which he was plagued with

sea sickness Motion sickness occurs due to a difference between actual and expected motion. Symptoms commonly include nausea, vomiting, cold sweat, headache, dizziness, tiredness, loss of appetite, and increased salivation. Complications may rarely include de ...

. On the opening day of the Games he won his first race, the first heat of the 800 metres run, finishing in a time of 2 min 10.0 sec. On the second day he lined up against the American favourite, Arthur Blake, in the 1500 metres run. Running shoulder to shoulder with Blake in the final straight, Flack powered ahead near the end to win by more than five metres in a time of 4:33.2. On the fourth day of the Games, Flack earned his second first-place medal, winning the 800 metres in 2 min 11.9 sec. It may be noted that, even by the standards of the time, the times required to win the 800 m and 1,500 m at the first Olympics were slow. Although there was no official world record in that era, by way of comparison, the local 880 yards championship in Flack's home colony of Victoria was won that year in 2:04.4 and the previous year (1895) in 2:03.4. At the Australasian Championships of 1896, the

mile run The mile run (1,760 yards or exactly 1,609.344 metres) is a middle-distance foot race. The history of the mile run event began in England, where it was used as a distance for gambling races. It survived track and field's switc ...

was won by New Zealander W. Bennett in a time of 4:28.6 – some 4.6s quicker than Flack's Olympic 1500 m time despite running 100 metres further. Just a day later, Flack tried for a treble with the

marathon The marathon is a long-distance foot race with a distance of , usually run as a road race, but the distance can be covered on trail routes. The marathon can be completed by running or with a run/walk strategy. There are also wheelchair div ...

event despite never having run a race more than 16 kilometres. He was in second place behind

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Albin Lermusiaux—bronze medallist in the 1500 m run, who Flack had already beaten—for much of the race. After 30–32 kilometres, the Frenchman dropped out and Flack was left in the lead, but 4–8 kilometres later (sources vary), Flack collapsed. In his deliriousness, when a Greek spectator tried to help him, Flack punched him to the ground. Flack was removed from the course and transported to the stadium by a carriage, wherein he was tended to by Prince Nicholas. Flack also competed in the tennis singles and doubles at the Olympics. He lost in the first round of the singles to Aristidis Akratopoulos of Greece. In the doubles he was paired with an English friend, George S. Robertson. They reached the semi-finals after a walkover in the first round, but lost their only match to

Dionysios Kasdaglis Dimitrios written also as Demetrius Emmanuel ( el, Δημήτριος Εμμανουήλ) Kasdaglis written also as Casdagli(s) ( el, Κάσδαγλης), (10 October 1872 in Salford – 6 July 1931 in Bad Nauheim) was a Greek- Egyptia ...

Egypt Egypt ( ar, مصر , ), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a List of transcontinental countries, transcontinental country spanning the North Africa, northeast corner of Africa and Western Asia, southwest corner of Asia via a land bridg ...

and

Demetrios Petrokokkinos Demetrios Stephen Petrokokkinos ( el, Δημήτριος Πετροκόκκινος, 17 April 1878 in Ilford (registered at birth in England as Demetrius Stephen Petrocochino) – 10 May 1942 in Cape Town) was a Greek tennis player. He ...

of Greece. They placed third due to their semi-final appearance, but medals for third places were not yet awarded in 1896. The medals were retroactively awarded in January 2008. Flack was a popular competitor at the 1896 games, and was commonly referred to as the "Lion of Athens".

Later life

In 1898, Flack returned to Victoria and the

Melbourne Melbourne ( ; Boonwurrung/ Woiwurrung: ''Narrm'' or ''Naarm'') is the capital and most populous city of the Australian state of Victoria, and the second-most populous city in both Australia and Oceania. Its name generally refers to a metro ...

-based family accounting firm, renamed Flack and Flack. Flack purchased a property near Berwick, where he stayed on weekends and bred

Friesian cattle Frisian most often refers to: *Frisia, a cross-border coastal region in Germany and the Netherlands **Frisians, the medieval and modern ethnic group inhabiting Frisia ***Frisii, the ancient inhabitants of Frisia prior to 600 AD **Frisian languages ...

. He never competed for Victoria again (or for Australia after the country was formed in 1901), but he joined the

Australian Olympic Committee Australian(s) may refer to: Australia * Australia, a country * Australians, citizens of the Commonwealth of Australia ** European Australians ** Anglo-Celtic Australians, Australians descended principally from British colonists ** Aboriginal Aus ...

(AOC) and was part of the first Australian delegation to attend an

International Olympic Committee The International Olympic Committee (IOC; french: link=no, Comité international olympique, ''CIO'') is a non-governmental sports organisation based in Lausanne, Switzerland. It is constituted in the form of an association under the Swis ...

(IOC)

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. Suffering from heart problems, Flack died in 1935, following an operation at a private hospital. He was cremated and his ashes were interred at Berwick Cemetery.

Legacy

Flack is commemorated by a bronze statue on the

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of High St, Berwick, which was unveiled in 1998 by former running great and later

Governor of Victoria The governor of Victoria is the representative of the monarch, King Charles III, in the Australian state of Victoria. The governor is one of seven viceregal representatives in the country, analogous to the governors of the other states, and t ...

John Landy John Michael Landy OLY (12 April 1930 – 24 February 2022) was an Australian middle-distance runner and state governor. He was the second man to break the four-minute mile barrier in the mile run and held the world records for the 1500-metre ...

. The former Berwick Recreational Reserve was renamed ''Edwin Flack Reserve'' in 1996 to honour the town's first Olympic hero and medal winner, and includes several sporting grounds including an athletics track, an

Australian rules football Australian football, also called Australian rules football or Aussie rules, or more simply football or footy, is a contact sport played between two teams of 18 players on an oval field, often a modified cricket ground. Points are scored by k ...

oval,

netball Netball is a ball sport played on a court by two teams of seven players. It is among a rare number of sports which have been created exclusively for female competitors. The sport is played on indoor and outdoor netball courts and is specifical ...

courts and soccer pitch.

Melbourne Grammar School (Pray and Work) , established = 1849 (on present site since 1858 - the celebrated date of foundation) , type = Independent, co-educational primary, single-sex boys secondary, day and boarding , denomination ...

's sporting complex at Port Melbourne has been named ''Edwin Flack Park'' in honour of their past student. Flack was commemorated on a 45-cent Australian postage stamp in the Olympic centenary year of 1996. The AOC named one of the streets alongside

Stadium Australia Stadium Australia, currently known as Accor Stadium for sponsorship purposes, is a multi-purpose stadium located in the Sydney Olympic Park, in Sydney, Australia. The stadium, which in Australia is sometimes referred to as Sydney Olympic Stad ...

Homebush Bay Homebush Bay is a bay on the south bank of the Parramatta River, in the west of Sydney, Australia. The name is also sometimes used to refer to an area to the west and south of the bay itself, which was formerly an official suburb of Sydney, ...

in Sydney, the venue of the

2000 Summer Olympics The 2000 Summer Olympics, officially the Games of the XXVII Olympiad and also known as Sydney 2000 ( Dharug: ''Gadigal 2000''), the Millennium Olympic Games or the Games of the New Millennium, was an international multi-sport event held from ...

, as ''Edwin Flack Avenue''. In 1985, Flack was inducted into the

Sport Australia Hall of Fame The Sport Australia Hall of Fame was established on 10 December 1985 to recognise the achievements of Australian sportsmen and sportswomen. The inaugural induction included 120 members with Sir Don Bradman as the first inductee and Dawn Fraser t ...

, and he was inducted into the

Hall of Fame in 2000. Athletics Australia's Edwin Flack Award, which is awarded to "an athlete who has rendered distinguished service to athletics", is named in his honour. Flack was portrayed by English actor Benedict Taylor in the 1984 television mini-series '' The First Olympics: Athens 1896''.

References

External links

*
Biography in Australian Dictionary of Biography
{{DEFAULTSORT:Flack, Edwin 1873 births 1935 deaths 19th-century Australian people 19th-century male tennis players Athletes (track and field) at the 1896 Summer Olympics 19th-century sportsmen Australian male tennis players Australian male middle-distance runners Australian male marathon runners People educated at Melbourne Grammar School Olympic athletes of Australia Olympic tennis players of Australia Olympic gold medalists for Australia Olympic bronze medalists for Australia Tennis people from Greater London Tennis players from Melbourne Tennis players at the 1896 Summer Olympics Olympic medalists in tennis Sport Australia Hall of Fame inductees Medalists at the 1896 Summer Olympics Olympic gold medalists in athletics (track and field) Olympic bronze medalists in athletics (track and field) English emigrants to colonial Australia People from Islington (district) Athletes from Melbourne People from Berwick, Victoria