| Eton Manor Boys' Club | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Location | |
 | |
London , E20 2ST England | |
| Coordinates | 51°33′14″N0°00′54″W / 51.554°N 0.015°W |
| Information | |
| Type | Boys club |
| Motto | Up the Manor[ citation needed ] |
| Established | 1909 |
| Founder | Gerald V Wellesley |
| Closed | 1967 |
| Gender | Boys |
| Age | 14to 18 |
| Publication | Chinwag [1] |
Eton Manor Boys' Club was a boys' sports club in London, England.
Eton Manor Boys' Club takes its name from Eton College, which from the 1880s had run a Christian mission to raise living standards in the Hackney Wick area of the East End of London, and from the Manor Farm, bought in 1912 to build a new sports clubhouse, known as 'The Manor House' in Riseholme Street [now demolished to make way for the East Cross Route] near Cadogan Terrace and Wick Road. The Mission Church, St Mary of Eton, is still the parish church, but combined with the bombed St Augustine after the Second World War. It is now called St Mary of Eton with St Augustine. In 1973 the connections with Eton College were severed.
In 1909 four Old Etonian philanthropists founded Eton Manor Boys' Club to provide sporting facilities separate from the Eton Christian Mission. [1] They were Gerald V. Wellesley; Arthur Villiers, the second son of Victor Child Villiers, 7th Earl of Jersey; Edward Cadogan, the sixth son of George Cadogan, 5th Earl Cadogan; and Alfred Wagg of the City of London Wagg banking family. [1] Gerald Wellesley passed on the leadership of the club to Arthur Villiers after the Great War; Villiers remained the primary guiding force behind the club until its closure. [2] He lived at Eton Manor Boys' Club from 1913 until his death in 1969. [1]
The club originally only accepted boys who had been members of the Eton Mission Boys' Club. [1] Additionally, under the club rules only boys between the ages of 13 and 16 could join. [1] [3] The club attempted to restricted some boys from interacting with girls through the short lived Junior Bachelors Society. [1]
The club's coaches included well-known sportsmen such as Douglas Jardine and Alf Ramsey. [3] Boys who passed the age of 18 were entitled to join the "Old Boys" club.
In 1920 an old rubbish tip site at the eastern end of Hackney Marshes was converted into the Club's new sports ground; it became well known as "The Wilderness". [3] Facilities included nine football pitches, two rugby pitches, cricket pitches, six tennis courts, a bowling green, a squash court and a running track. The running track was acquired from the 1948 olympics at the White City and relayed at the Wilderness and became the first floodlit running track in Britain [3]
In the 1950s, the club had a reputation as an elite boys sporting club as well as incorporating career advice to the club's list of activities. [4]
At its peak the Club had become a leading member of the London Federation of Boys' Clubs, with success in many sports.[ citation needed ] It produced double Olympic Gold Medal middleweight boxer Harry Mallin, [3] [5] successful at the 1920 Antwerp Olympics and 1924 Paris Olympics and who retired undefeated; and welterweight boxer Nicholas Gargano, a bronze medallist at the 1956 Melbourne Olympics. [3] [6] A news article in 2010 stated that Gargano would strengthen his arms by chopping wood at the clubhouse [7] and also learned how to box at the club.Amongst many others were Len wills who played football for Arsenal and Ted Lester who played cricket for Middlesex [5] T [3] [8]
In the mid 1960s, Arthur Villiers decided to close Eton Manor. The reasons were unclear, although the tragic death of his preferred successor David Shaw-Kennedy and both costs and the changing nature of the surrounding population have been cited as possible explanations and perhaps overwhelmingly the Greater London Council plan to build a new link road requiring the demolition of the Manor House and the Club House in Riseholme Street [2]
The playing fields at Eton Manor fell into disuse by 2001, before being selected as part of the London bid for the proposed London 2012 Olympic Games. The site became the venue for the 2012 Summer Paralympics tennis venue Eton Manor. [9] Eton College has a second connection to the 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games, as the rowing event venue was the College's own facility, Dorney Lake. [10]
The surviving archives of the Eton Manor Boys' Club are held at the Bishopsgate Library. [3]
After Eton Manor closed in 1967, The Manor Charitable Trust, which supported it, moved into the educational field and in 1968 renamed its Oxfordshire centre Villiers Park. Its other educational centre in Cambridgeshire, which opened in 1989, was also named Villiers Park. The Oxfordshire centre was closed in the late 1990s, and all operations moved to Cambridgeshire. The trust's main buildings at the Cambridge site – Cadogan House, Wellesley House and Wagg House – are named four colleagues of Villiers who were also involved in the establishment of the trust. In 2000 The Manor Charitable Trust changed its name to Villiers Park Educational Trust. [4]
Villiers Park Educational Trust is now focused on improving social mobility in the United Kingdom. They aim to address economic inequality in the UK through delivering evidence-based programmes working with less advantaged young people in the UK between the ages of 14 and 19 to ensure they reach their full academic potential. . [11]
The charity's headquarters are in Foxton, Cambridgeshire. Their activities are delivered both at their residential site in this location, and regionally by staff in multiple UK areas.
The Scholars Programme was established in 2009 and has expanded to run in seven areas across the UK. The Programme supports highly-able less advantaged students aged 14 to 19, with the aim of helping them reach their full potential. The Programme provides a four-year course of enrichment activities for each student, focusing on raising aspirations, confidence and motivation. The programme aims to build essential skills and behaviours that empower young people to succeed. [12] The University of Lancaster, UEA, and the University of Suffolk are all lead partners in the Villiers Park Scholars Programme. [13] [14] [15]
The Inspiring Excellence programme is a series of five-day subject-specific residential courses designed to introduce highly-able A-level students to university level study. The programme aims to inspire state school students to pursue higher education at a leading university. The charity runs approximately 32 courses each academic year, supporting over 800 students.
There is an active group of Eton Manor Boys' Club Old Boys, the Eton Manor Association. It continued to honour the former club members who died during the two World Wars at a Remembrance Sunday service at the Memorials on The Wilderness. The Olympic Delivery Authority, LOCOG and the Olympic Park Legacy Company which in 2012 became the London Legacy Development Corporation successively combined to provide a safe storage area of the Memorials removed during the development and use of The Wilderness site for the London 2012 Olympics; they were due to be restored to the Eton Manor site in 2014. [8]
Six sports clubs originating from Eton Manor Boys' Club and the Eton Mission are still in existence:
Eton College is a public school in Eton, Berkshire, England. It was founded in 1440 by Henry VI under the name Kynge's College of Our Ladye of Eton besyde Windesore, making it the 18th-oldest school in the Headmasters' and Headmistresses' Conference (HMC). Originally intended as a sister institution to King's College, Cambridge, Eton is known for its history, wealth, and notable alumni, known as Old Etonians.
Radley College, formally St Peter's College, Radley or even the College of St. Peter at Radley, is a public school near Radley, Oxfordshire, England, which was founded in 1847. The school covers 800 acres including playing fields, a golf course, a lake, and farmland. Before the counties of England were re-organised, the school was in Berkshire.
Hackney Marshes is an area of open space in London's Lower Lea Valley, lying on the western bank of the River Lea. It takes its name from its position on the eastern boundary of Hackney, the principal part of the London Borough of Hackney, and from its origin as an area of true marsh.
Ashford is a town in Surrey, England, 14 mi (23 km) west of central London. Its name derives from a crossing point of the River Ash, a distributary of the River Colne. Historically part of Middlesex, the town has been part of Surrey since 1965. Ashford consists of relatively low density low- and medium-rise buildings, none of them being high rise. If excluding apartments most houses are semi-detached.
Dorney Lake is a purpose-built rowing lake and Meetings & Events Venue in England. It is near the village of Dorney, Buckinghamshire, and is around 3 km west of Windsor and Eton, close to the River Thames.
Surbiton High School is a private independent school in Surbiton in the Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames, Greater London, England. It has seven buildings overall including the Boys’ Preparatory School, Girls’ Preparatory School, the Senior School and the Sixth Form.
Bishopsgate Library, now known as Bishopgate Institute's Special Collections and Archives is an independent, charity-funded library located within the Bishopsgate Institute in the City of London.
Eton Manor Football Club was a football club based in East London, England.
Peter K. Reed OBE is a retired British Olympic rower. Reed is a three-times Olympic gold medallist – earning gold in the Men's coxless four at the 2008 and 2012 Olympics, and then a gold medal in the Men's eight at the 2016 Olympics in Rio de Janeiro. He has also won five gold medals and three silver medals at the World Championships.
Riseholme College is a Further and Higher Education college in Lincolnshire, specialising in land-based subjects such as Agriculture, Equine and Animal Management.
Manor Garden Allotments were allotment gardens occupying 4.5 acres (18,000 m2) between the River Lea and the Channelsea River in Hackney Wick, London, England. They are also sometimes referred to as Eastway Allotments, particularly in the 2012 Summer Olympics planning application documents. They were demolished to make way for the Olympic site. The site was formerly in the London Borough of Hackney, but after ward boundary changes in the 1990s the footprint sat within London Borough of Newham. At the time of eviction the site was owned by Lee Valley Regional Park Authority. The "Eastway Allotments" were known more locally as "Abbott's Shoot" or "Bully Fen".
Andrew Triggs Hodge is a British former rower - a three time Olympic champion and four time world champion. In the British coxless four in 2012 he set a world's best time which still stood as of 2023.
The Windsor Boys' School is a comprehensive all-boys upper school and sixth form located on Maidenhead Road in Windsor, Berkshire, England, within the Royal Borough of Windsor and Maidenhead Local Authority. The school specialises in the arts.
Anna Rose Watkins MBE PhD is a British rower.
Andrew James Ronald Lindsay is a British Olympic gold medal-winning rower and the co-CEO of Telecom Plus, which owns Utility Warehouse.
Daniel Noonan is an Australian former representative rower. He was a national champion, a world champion, a dual Olympian and an Olympic medal winner.
The rowing competitions at the 2012 Olympic Games in London were held from 28 July to 4 August 2012, at Dorney Lake which, for the purposes of the Games venue, was officially termed Eton Dorney. Fourteen medal events were contested by 550 athletes, 353 men and 197 women.
Constantine Michael Louloudis is a Greek-British rower. He is an Olympic medal winner, two-time world champion and four-time Boat Race winner.
Melanie Wilson is a British rower who competed for the GB rowing team. At the 2012 Summer Olympics, she competed in the Women's quadruple sculls. At the 2016 Summer Olympics she won a silver medal in the women's eight.
Lee Valley Hockey and Tennis Centre is a sports and leisure venue located in Leyton, London Borough of Waltham Forest, to the north of Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park. It is regularly used for international field hockey fixtures by both the Great Britain men's and women's field hockey teams. It hosted the 2018 Women's Hockey World Cup. Owned and managed by Lee Valley Regional Park Authority, the site was previously known as Eton Manor and was a wheelchair tennis venue for the 2012 Summer Paralympics before being converted for public use and reopening in June 2014.
| International | |
|---|---|
| National | |
