by Stan Eldon
Regrets, I have a few. Not being selected for the 1960 Rome Olympics has to be one, but perhaps the missed opportunities for a world record were more important. The lesson I learned, and would pass on to any athlete today, is never let an opportunity pass you by. There were three races in my career, where I was in such good form that I should have picked up a world record at three miles, six miles or 5,000 metres, but on each occasion I won races so easily and probably did not push myself to the limit which would have given me those records. Always grab the opportunity when it comes, and do not leave it for another day, because that other day may never come. I suppose that applies to everything in life.
In those days of the late 1950s and early 60s there were no specialist road running shoes. There were heavy trainers, like the Adidas Rom, but the racing shoe for me, and for many others, was a pair of Woolworth’s plimsolls; cost about four shillings and sixpence, or 22.5p. They were normally brown, and I used to put black polish on them, partly I think to smarten them up and partly to make them slightly waterproof. I think this failed on both counts, but as racing shoes they were successful as they were lighter than trainers. There was no heavy padding, just a thin runner sole, but they never gave me any injuries despite running up to 100 miles a week.
In June 1964 I lined up at Windsor Castle again for the Poly Marathon and this time I was thirty-fourth in 2:34:04.
Later in that year, my old training and racing partner Bruce Tulloh, went out to Japan for the Tokyo Olympics. While he was there he was given a pair of revolutionary shoes called Tiger Marups; a superb lightweight shoe with a special thin sole, but with some cushioning and light leather uppers. When he met the Onitsuka Company (now Asics) who made the shoes, he told them he had a friend who was big in the sports business in the UK. He was referring to me with a small shop on the outskirts of Reading. He brought the shoe back and I was very impressed, as I had never seen anything like it before. It was very light and comfortable, and was completely different to anything I had seen before. I wrote to Japan and introduced myself, and very quickly I had a response offering me the sole UK rights to the shoes and their other products. I had to set about finding out how to import the shoes, and this was not easy as there were no agencies around in those days like now, and the banks did not know very much either. Somehow I got the information I needed, and the first shoes were ordered.
When they arrived, runners were queuing up to buy them at sixty-five shillings a pair. These first shoes were called a Marup, but others followed including a cheaper canvas version of the Marup, and Marion came up with the name Cub, Tiger Cub, for the cheapest shoes in the range, and this sold for just twenty-nine shillings and sixpence.
To help finance the new venture I formed a new company, Stan Eldon Wholesale Limited, with an old school friend John Hatton, who lived in Windsor and worked in financial services. We rented a warehouse under the railway arches in Windsor, the scene of many “Carry On” films, and that was our base for the importing and distribution of the new Tiger shoes and other products.
We invited the Onitsuka Company over for discussions about expanding the business, and Mr Onitsuka himself came along with the finance director Mr Kitami. We hired a limousine and collected them from Heathrow, and took them to lunch at Skindles Hotel, then a very up-market restaurant on the Thames at Maidenhead. In the car on the way to Maidenhead, the conversation somehow got around to the war. Colonel Onitsuka had served in Burma and by chance so had our chauffeur. As the conversation progressed I thought ‘Oh dear this will blow it’ especially when the two decided they had been exactly in the same war zone at the same time, and could have fought against each other. On the contrary, when we arrived at the hotel they were getting on so well we had to take the chauffeur with us into lunch. The business discussions with the company were very interesting, as they used an abacus for their financial calculations. The Japanese were not using electronic calculators in the early 1960s.
About this stage in my business life I was approached by Mr North from the Kit Kat Cafe at Blackpool, to see if I would employ his son Gerry. Yes, it was my old running colleague from Army days Gerry North. His dad gave me £500 towards the business so that I could afford to take Gerry on. Gerry worked on selling the Tiger shoes to shops and individuals for some time, before leaving me to start up his own company, where he carried on selling the same products.
We were then responsible for another new product. I had seen something called track pants, lightweight cotton tracksuit-type bottoms; baggy but light, and with the idea of the ski pants that Pirie had given me. I set about redesigning them, and had a large quantity made up in Hong Kong. These were a slimmer fit, and I called them Tracksters. They were a great success as they sold for just under £1. I never did register them and another runner, Mr Marathon himself, Ron Hill, made them a little more sophisticated and has sold them ever since. My loss his gain.
I did not get the opportunity to take advantage of either the imported Tracksters or the great Tiger shoes, as a few years after I started importing, the Wilson Government introduced an import restriction which required the putting up of half the value of the imports in cash in this country, as well as funding the letters of credit to pay for the goods in Japan. It was crippling for small businesses like mine, and I had to get out of the wholesale/import business quickly. I did and the retail business survived.
Our business was all about innovation, and we were first in the market place, not just with special products like the Tiger shoes and Tracksters. We got involved with Fashion Shows, which we did on a regular basis, often to support charities, these were good fun and I enjoyed my behind the scenes job of helping the attractive models disrobe and prepare for their next catwalk appearance; the trouble was it all happened so quickly, and there was never enough time to take in the beautiful scenery. The girls were all local and came from a local agency, and their performances were always very professional. We started up ‘Football and Cricket’ evenings, and at these we would show the latest clothing, footwear and equipment to invited people from the particular sport. On the football side we often had the help of West Ham goalkeeper Phil Parkes at the football shows, and at one of our cricket evenings we had almost the whole Hampshire County Cricket Club team, along with some very special cricket bats we had borrowed from the bat manufacturers, like a bat used by the Edward VIII when Prince of Wales, and another used by the great Jack Hobbs. They were very successful evenings and helped us to build up a strong customer base with the local sports clubs.
I spent a lot of money on advertising, especially with the Reading Evening Post, who had a very persuasive salesman, John Madejski, the multimillionaire owner and chairman of Reading Football Club. This was before he had started his Auto Trader empire that brought him the great wealth.
The birth of all my children was planned, that is up to 1971, when on 29th July, Alexandra Michelle came along. She was our fifth and final child, and I missed her birth by a few minutes. As it was Marion’s fifth she had to go to hospital for the birth, and I was at home looking after the family and waiting for news. On the day she was born I went to bed at about 11 p.m. and tried to sleep, but the phone rang and it was the Royal Berks. Marion had just gone down to have our baby. I drove across Reading at lightning speed and arrived at the Royal Berkshire Hospital maternity unit, which was in semi-darkness and appeared to be almost shut down for the night. I found a gown and mask and made my way through to the delivery room just after the birth, with wife and baby still on the trolley. All was well, and after a short stay it was home to catch up on sleep, get the children off to school next morning, and open up the shop. I could not complain, because on previous occasions prior to our other children being born, Marion had worked up to the day of birth, sometimes in the shop and on one occasion she was paperhanging and decorating up to a couple of hours before going into labour. The birth of our fifth child changed our life. Up to that time we had never had a televisio
n in our home, but after this latest addition to the family we added a TV and had no more children!
Chapter Twelve: 176 Miles for a Joke (and for Charity)
I ran the first of my long charity runs in 1973, when the Variety Club of Great Britain invited me to walk or run from Reading to the Sportsman Club in Tottenham Court Road, London. Various sports personalities took part, and were to travel to London by different methods. These included Freddie Trueman who travelled from York by stagecoach, and then rode on a horse from Hyde Park to the Grosvenor House; Jimmy Savile who walked into the final destination from Broadmoor Hospital in Berkshire; Jimmy Hill walked from Haringey; Stanley Mortenson (footballer) walked part of the way from Blackpool accompanied by the Mayor of Blackpool and 2.5 cwt of Blackpool rock. There were boxers, a former Miss World, and many others from different walks of life, and all were sponsored for a minimum of £1,000. The total raised from the walk was over £89,000. The lunch was sponsored by Sir Jack Cohen, from Tesco; there were around 500 present and the bill was £5,000. The special guest was HRH Duke of Edinburgh.
My run started from the Evening Post offices in Reading, and the newspaper were my main sponsor along with Racal. I ran the first stage of twenty miles to Windsor in two hours. I ran to the castle and arrived in time to walk out from there ahead of the band of the Coldstream Guards, who had been changing the guard. A rare privilege which is not normally allowed. After the band turned off to head back to barracks, I turned right out of the castle and started to run and walk again down the hill and through Datchet for the final twenty-five plus miles to the finish at the Sportsman Club in Tottenham Court Road, where I was met by Eric Morley, the Chief Barker of the Variety Club, and footballer Jimmy Hill, at about four o’clock in the afternoon.
The next day we all attended a Variety Club Dinner at the Grosvenor House in the presence of the Duke of Edinburgh. It gave me my first insight into large fund raising, when Billy Butlin and Fred Pontin were trying to outbid each other for a very large stick of Blackpool Rock. Their bids went up to thousands of pounds, and after one of them had secured it, they immediately put it back to raise even more money.
There was a long hot, very hot, summer in 1976, and to keep the family cool and amused I erected a large above-ground swimming pool in the garden at St Peter’s Hill. It was well used that summer, as I was very busy with fashion shows and other promotional activities for the business. It was great to get home at midnight and dive into the pool for a swim and cool off.
In 1977 I helped to set up a Superstars Competition in Reading, with the help of Robin Sharp, a local school teacher and tennis coach. The name we used for the competition was Skillmaster, as Superstars was a registered name used by the televised competition. The event was staged each summer for a number of years, and some of the best sporting talent from within the Borough of Reading took part. The first event was staged in 1977, as part of the Reading Silver Jubilee celebrations, and the funds raised by the event went to the Queen’s Silver Jubilee Appeal Fund, which earned me a certificate from that fund. The competition was organised by the Reading and District Sports Council and my company, Stan Eldon Sports, who were also the sponsors. The competitors had to compete in a wide range of sporting activities, so that talent in one sport would not necessarily be an advantage. The major events were swimming, running, cycling, archery, goal scoring, and a number of special events to test the skill, as well as the physical ability of the competitor.
Later, one of the regular participants, Alan Taylor, a professional footballer with Reading, wanted to take up athletics where he had shown more than a little talent. Because he was a professional I fought his case with the athletic authorities, so that he could take part in the then amateur sport of athletics. He got the permission that was required and joined Reading AC, and I became his coach. His best event was the 880 yards where he improved very rapidly and quickly got down to a respectable 1:55. He learned fast and was a very good prospect. He had sprinting skills as well, and could kick from 300 yards before the finish, and leave any field behind him. I went to his wedding and he and Shirley were a very happy couple, but tragically within months he was in a car crash with another ex-Skillmaster competitor at Arborfield near Reading. He was killed and his colleague was badly injured, losing a foot. I don’t think any other sad event has had a greater impact on me, and I suppose that is why I have never got directly involved with coaching a talented athlete again.
In the same year I was carrying out a speaking engagement in Reading, at the lunch of the Federation of Master Builders. Something always triggers the memory about events, and my memory of this occasion is very clear. I was just reaching the end of my talk, and a buzz went around the room. I didn’t think it was anything I had said that caused such a stir. No it was the news that Harold Wilson had resigned as Prime Minister which had come as a complete shock, but I think it was welcomed by my audience of builders and developers. Later in his retirement I was to meet Lord Wilson when he attended the opening of a community centre near my home in Caversham.
In November 1977 I received a copy of Punch magazine from an old school friend, David Stone, who lived in Switzerland. He sent it to me as there was a story about the police in it, and the photo used was one of me in my days on the beat. Solicitors had just started to advertise their services, and it was a comical skit on what the public could expect from other professionals by way of advertising their services. These included nurses, judges, clergy and the police. I wrote to the editor of Punch and received a reply which effectively said they thought they were using an old library picture of a policeman who was a long time dead!
After a period away from running, I had started back having a weekly run in the early 1970s. In 1975, while working in one of my shops at Tilehurst, Reading, I had a visit from a Tony Holden who was a DJ on the new commercial radio station for the Thames Valley, Radio 210. He was running a sports show on every Monday evening, and wanted someone to talk about sport, and so he had found his way to me. Just before the Easter weekend in 1976, we had a chat on air about the new jogging craze that was big in the States, and almost as a joke we challenged Reading people to turn up in Prospect Park, Reading, across the road from the radio station for a run around the park on the Tuesday after that Easter Monday. The radio station promised everyone a T-shirt who turned up.
On that Tuesday evening I went along to the park and Tony Holden also turned out. We thought that we might be the only people there, but as the appointed time of 7 p.m. approached, we were amazed to have a couple of hundred people there in their plimsolls and training shoes ready for a run. Needless to say the supply of T-shirts did not last long, and we had to promise to get more for the following week. The group kept going for the rest of that year, and some decided to meet on a regular basis; and that was how the Reading Joggers was born. After their running together they decided to become a club, and about one year later they were formed into the Reading Joggers, and that club is still alive and kicking today.
I continued to work on 210 every Monday night until they discontinued the programme. It was great fun and I enjoyed taking along guests and interviewing them about their sporting activities. My broadcasting days were not over even then, as when the half marathon was up and running, I was always on the air talking about the event and those taking part. In many ways this radio station was to be one of the keenest supporters of the event in coming years.
In May of the same year I was invited back to Windsor for the opening of the new track. The local council had been persuaded to finally put down a quality all-weather running surface to replace the grass track on the Vansittart Recreation Ground, where I had run many races and carried out much of my early training with the Windsor club. I ran a ceremonious single lap of the track before it was officially opened by the then Mayor of the Royal Borough, Kit Aston (later Sir Kit Aston). The athletic match was won by Southampton AC from the home team, with Surrey Beagles third, followed by
Newbury, Reading and Maidenhead.
The 1970s were a busy time, with the family growing up and the business growing as well. It was difficult to find time for holidays, so I bought a new large on-site caravan at Wimborne in Dorset. Most weekends during the summer I would dash away from the shop at 5.30 p.m. sharp, and by about six o’clock everything, including the kids, were bundled into the car and it was off to the caravan. It gave us a break, if it was a very hectic and short break from the working week. We would arrive on Saturday evening around 8 p.m., and would leave about the same time or earlier on Sunday evening, and very occasionally very early on Monday morning. Then it was back to school for the family and back to the shops for me until the next Saturday evening.
Through the Joggers a number of Fun Runs were started in the area, and because of my involvement with them, I was invited by the Sports Council in 1978 to be part of a steering committee to look into forming a National Jogging Association.
That original committee was made up from a number of high-profile people who were into ‘jogging’ and running. They included John Disley, who later started the London Marathon, along with Chris Brasher, Harold Evans (Editor of the Sunday Times), Andy Etchells (the first editor of Running Magazine), Ted Dexter (England cricket captain and later selector), John Whetton (one of our most successful ever UK milers and 1,500 metre runners), Tom McNab (athletic coach and author of the book Flanagan’s Run), and myself. Funding was provided by the Sports Council, and the NJA was formed and was very active for a number of years, helping to promote running for fitness and health.
I was still running my sports shops and employing quite a few of my family; my brother Bernard, his son Philip and three of my own children, Caroline, Jonathan and Neil. We had always led the way in the sports trade and I had written articles for the trade magazine. So when a computer was shown to me that could control stock through the till, I jumped at the chance and invested the £3,000 to £4,000. It was a good system and I spent nearly a year putting every item of stock, including shoelaces and football studs, onto the data base. It worked and I got hooked on computers.
