The club has received the sad news that Eric Hall has passed away at the age of 89 after an illness.

Eric was the club’s longest serving member, having first stepped into Belgrave Hall over 73 years ago, and at 89 was also our oldest member.

He was a Life Member and served as club president from 1999 to 2000.

He competed at the 1956 Olympics in Melbourne, coming 9th in the 50km race walk, and again at the 1960 Rome Olympics, finishing 10th in the 20km walk.

A full obituary by Alan Mead can be found here. An abridged version follows.

“Why don’t you meet us outside Kingston Odeon on Saturday,” offered Eric’s friends. “We’re going up to our club at Wimbledon.” A naïve Eric thought he was going to join a rambling club. An added impetus was that it was the summer of the 1948 London Olympics. Eric and his schoolfriends were avid autograph hunters and in nearby Richmond Park, not far from Ladderstile Gate, there were rows of barracks that were one of the sites of the ‘Olympic villages.’ So not only were exotic athletes to be spied in the park, but this club at Wimbledon had members who were Olympic competitors. Eric completed his application form and became a Belgrave Harrier on 1st November 1948.

A short time later while awaiting the call to start in the Civil Service, his first experience of work was at the famous Kingston department store of Bentall’s. Life was now balanced between training for Race Walking, and a career which saw Eric become a Customs & Excise Officer, working in time at Waterloo, Victoria, Heathrow, and the London Docks.

Progress in his chosen sport was relentless. Eric soaked up the advice from older members and grew stronger as he entered his mid-20s. The arrival in 1955 of novice walker Stanley Vickers, who was setting out on his own path to international recognition, gave Eric yet more impetus to improve. He was already making a name for himself in the longer events – but racing alongside Stan showed him that his basic speed could be improved, and that success could also come in the ‘sprints’ of 2 and 7 miles on the track.​

The 1956 Melbourne Olympics

In 1955 third place was gained in the National R.W.A. 20 miles, held at Wimbledon, and with that encouragement he set his sights on the 50km event at the 1956 Melbourne Olympics. At 24 years of age, he was thought to be a bit young for the longest Olympic event, but he overcame that prejudice, taking three weeks off work without pay to train for the trial – the National 50km – in which he placed second to Don Thompson. The selectors then wanted him to turn out again in a couple of weeks’ time to warrant his Olympic selection and asked him to tackle the Birmingham 25 mile race. Wise heads at the Club were adamant: “No, you’ve done enough. Don’t mess it up by doing too much too soon.” He stuck to his guns and selection for Melbourne was achieved.

The Melbourne city experience was wonderful for Eric. He loved Australia and revisited many times throughout the rest of his life. But the race was not a happy one. After rainy and cool conditions which had the British rubbing their hands with glee, race day proved to be hot and very humid. Eric lost over 3 kg in weight during the event (he was only just over 61 kg to start with) and went through a very bad patch when it was all that he could do to focus on the blue line marking the route and aim for each next drinking station. Several competitors ahead of him collapsed and Britain’s no. 1, Don Thompson, was so far gone that he walked into the back of a parked car and, dazed, then set off again in the wrong direction. Of 21 competitors, six failed to finish and two were disqualified. Thompson was hospitalised for three days. Eric was 9th and remembered nothing about the finish – except for Stan’s comment, “I had to persuade them to keep the stadium gates open for you!” 

A most satisfying victory came in 1957 when Eric became the first Belgravian to win the R.W.A. National 20 miles title, but disappointment followed in ’58 when he was controversially omitted from Britain’s European Championship 20km team. The race winner – by nearly two minutes – was Stan Vickers. The two good friends trained and raced regularly together, with Eric never more then a few seconds behind on race days. He surely would have placed 2nd in Stockholm, making it a Belgrave and GBR 1-2.

Club life was always a family affair. Past President Tom Morrell was involved in many Belgrave activities, be it looking after the Club House or buying prizes, race numbers and pins, or selling Belgrave racing kit. And he was helped in much of this by daughter Mavis, a keen athlete herself, as well known in Belgrave circles as she was in her own club – she competed for Selsonia Ladies AC. Eric and Mavis first got together in around 1957 when Eric had to be accepted by her Belgrave ‘brothers’ Bob Taylor, George Flanagan and Bill Couzens, and ‘uncles’ Tom Carter and Charlie Jones. They were married in 1959.

A second chance at Olympic glory

A further chance at Olympic glory came in 1960 when the Games visited another sultry city – Rome in September. This time, when many British distance athletes found themselves unduly affected by the humidity, Eric was able to produce a 20km performance that he was very happy with, placing 10th. Other British walkers were successful too, with Stan Vickers taking the bronze in Eric’s race and the diminutive Don Thompson of Metropolitan Walking Club winning the gold medal in the 50km with Tom Mission, also of Met. WC, 5th. Thompson had learned a lot from his exploits at Melbourne four years earlier; he had prepared by exercising in his own hot-house – a steam filled bathroom at home with radiators on at full blast.

With the leadership of ‘The General,’ Jack Goswell, the Belgrave walking team had become one of, if not, the strongest in the land. By the end of the ‘50s and into the ‘60s a visit to an ordinary inter-club track & field event at Battersea Park on a Wednesday evening could allow one to observe international standard competition when the 2 miles walkers lined up on the cinders and set winning times that sometimes were not so far behind long-standing British Records.

Eric’s career now took him away from London and what with the raising of a family and increasing seniority in the Civil Service, perhaps it was time to think about retiring from athletics. Nevertheless, a last-minute entry for the trial for the ‘64 Tokyo Olympic 50km saw him line up at Crystal Palace and with little preparation he placed 5th – a possible third Olympiad had been within his grasp.

Manchester, Leicester, Staines, Norwich: all at one time or another became home to the Hall family over the next two decades before, in retirement, they settled near Colchester – just about within striking distance of Belgrave Hall. Having been unable to put as much as they’d have liked back into the Club during those working years, Eric and Mavis were now able to support the Harriers in all that they did, encouraging the team at British League matches, Road Relay and Cross-Country Races. And of course, at Race Walking events, where Eric competed as a veteran, there was always a crowd of familiar faces.

Eric was elected a Life Member of Belgrave Harriers way back in 1957, and in 1999 he was made President. But although Belgrave remained a huge part of his life, he had many other interests too:  local history, genealogy, and study with the Open University to obtain several degrees. For some time, he was the Treasurer of the British Olympians Society, and was an avid collector of athletics memorabilia. Looking back over the years, as was often done when he met up with his many old athletics friends, he regretted the gradual loss of popularity of Race Walking – at one time as much a part of club life as any other branch of our sport. But he had no regrets about what athletics and Club life had given him: comradeship, travel, a family, and the chance to represent his country at two Olympic Games.