Following the publishing of the picture of the Andover Athletic Club Ladies from 1959, Pauline Chilton provided more nostalgic fodder in the form of a photo taken a year before showing her with the girls from the Mid Hants Schools Championships.
It was taken on the Andover Girls Grammar School fields which are now part covered by the Winton School extension and was the year in which Pauline, then Baker, won the Andover AC Club Championships in 100 yards, 150 yards and javelin.
Along with Rosemary Hobbs from Aldershot and Pauline Foester at Portsmouth, she was one of the three top lady athletes in Hampshire and competed in three the All-England championships.
In total she was club champion in 100 yards, 150 yards, discus, javelin, long jump, high jump and shot despite being forced in those days to train in a variety of fields as the original club was nomadic.
Pauline remembers: “We trained for a while on Kellys’ Field in Weyhill Road then in Hedge End Road where we could run around the green. Later we used the Grammar School field near Ashfield Road where we had an old corrugated shed to change in which only had room for four or five and you could only stand upright in the middle!”
The club HQ was in the old Scout hut in Dene Road but circumstances went against the club and it faded away until reborn into the successful organisation it is today.
Pauline added “We had no sponsorship or facilities then and we all were working by 15 years old and I went off to Salisbury Tech, married at 19 and my career was over. ”
Meanwhile Yvonne Smart (nee Collins) who replied a couple of weeks ago from Australia, has e-mailed to say that if any of her old friends and colleagues would like to contact her, she can be found on art.yvonne@iinet.net.au Another two of the girls mentioned have now been traced as Wendy Buckle’s brother Gerald, who still lives in Andover, sent her the photo and her reply is on the letters page inside.
She is now Wendy Scoates and along with Janet Shears (now Headley) they both married RAF men and travelled before settling in St Ives in Cambridgeshire. Janet is now living in North Carolina, USA having emigrated with her children.
Share your sporting memories with the rest of Andover by contacting Kerry at the sportsdesk.
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