Fifty
Years of Success with the Bahamas Association of Athletics Associations
Alpheus Finlayson for the IAAF
6 May 2002 - On May 6th, 1952 a group of men interested in the
advancement of Track and Field in the British Colony of the Bahama Islands met
at the office of Hon. Alfred Francis Adderley on Bay and Parliament Street in
Nassau to form the Bahamas Amateur Athletic Association.
Some twenty-five years before the legendary Charley Major Sr. had won the High Jump in the Milrose Games and also the Amateur Athletic Union Championships in New York.
However, sports in the colony in 1952 had come to a crucial turning point. Sir Durward Knowles, the legendary sailor had participated in World Championships as well as the 1948 Olympics, as a member of the British team. In 1952 the desire was to have a Bahamian Olympic Team in Helsinki. This could have only happened if there was a Bahamas Olympic Association.
The problem was that a National Olympic Committee needed to be established. For this to happen it was necessary to have at least three “amateur” national governing bodies that were affiliated with the international governing body of their particular sport.
At the time, there was a Bahamas Athletic Association but it was customary for “non amateurs” including professional boxers to participate in Track and Field in the colony at that time.
So a new body, the Bahamas Amateur Athletic Association was formed, which made application to and was recognized by the International Amateur Athletic Federation. The next day, May 7th, 1952 saw the formation of the Bahamas Olympic Association. So we have a double Golden Anniversary Celebration in Bahamian sports.
Founding members of the Bahamas Amateur Athletic Association were president Alfred Francis Adderley, Hon. Reginald Farrington, Sir Randol Fawkes, Joseph Garfunkle, Edward S. Mitchell, Cyril Richardson, Reginald J. Robertson, Cecil V. Bethel, Sir Kendal Isaacs, Edwin Davies, Fred Moultrie, Sir Gerald Cash, and Sir Orville Turnquest. Sir Gerald and Sir Orville, who both served as Governor Generals are the only two living founders.
However, no Bahamian team participated in Helsinki in 1952.
In 1954 the first Bahamian Track team was selected and participated in the Empire Games in Vancouver, Canada. The team included sprinters Leonard “Skeeter” Dames and Irrington “Rinky” Isaacs, deceased, as well as middle-distance runner Cyril “Peepsight” Johnson. Tex Lunn was selected for the team but did not travel due to illness. Cyril Richardson, then president of the association, headed the delegation.
The next year a team also participated in the Pan American Games in Mexico City.
In 1956 18-year-old sprinter Thomas Robinson was the lone Track and Field participant in the Melbourne, Australia Olympics.
First international success came in 1957 at the West Indian Federation Games in Kingston when a relay team of Oscar Francis, Enoch Backford, Thomas Grant, and Robinson won a bronze medal in the 440-yd relay.
Then at the tender age of 20, Thomas Robinson shocked the world in winning the Gold medal in the 220 yd. at the 1958 British Empire Games in Cardiff, Wales. He also won the silver in the 100-yd. These performances put the Bahamas on the international Track and Field map.
Much has happened in the 44 years since Cardiff. Bahamian Track and Field stars have won medals in every major regional and world event. In 1964 at the Tokyo Olympic Games, Robinson made it to the final of the 100m. In 1966 the Queen Elizabeth Sports Center with an En Tout Cas Track was inaugurated under the presidency of Sir Arlington Butler. The first international meet, the Carifta Games was held in the Bahamas in 1976.
An all weather Chevron 440 Track was installed at the Queen Elizabeth Sports Center in 1981 under the presidency of Dr. Bernard Nottage. The stadium was named the Thomas A. Robinson Track and Field Stadium.
In 1982 Dr. Bernard Nottage was elected president of the Central American and Caribbean Athletic Confederation. Bernard Livingstone Bostwick was his Secretary/Treasurer.
Frank Rutherford won the bronze medal in the Triple Jump in the 1987 IAAF World Indoor Championships in Indianapolis, becoming the first Bahamian to win a medal in a World event. That summer at the Congress of the IAAF in Rome after several years campaigning, Dr. Bernard Nottage was successful in getting the IAAF to change its constitution whereby each member country had one vote. He was also successful in getting the age for Junior females to be the same as junior males, that is not twenty in the year of competition. Before this male athletes were under twenty and females were under nineteen.
In 1988, Eugene Greene won a bronze medal in the Triple Jump at the IAAF World Junior Championships in Sudbury, Canada.
At the 1989 IAAF World Cup in Barcelona, Spain, Lavern Eve won a bronze medal in the Javelin, with Pauline Davis-Thompson winning a gold medal in the 1600m relay.
All the above successes laid the way for the historic bronze medal by Rutherford in the Triple Jump in Barcelona. Rutherford became the first Bahamian to win a Track and Field medal in the Olympic Games.
In Gothenburg, Sweden, Troy Kemp won the country’s first World Championships Gold in the High Jump in 1995.
During the 1999 IAAF Congress
in Seville, Spain, Alpheus Finlayson, tenth president of the federation was
elected to the Council of the 26 member IAAF.
Then
at the following World Championships in Seville, the team of Eldece
Clarke-Lewis, Savetheda Fynes, Chandra Sturrup, Pauline Davis-Thompson, and
Debbie Ferguson won the Gold medal in the 400m relay. On return to Nassau they
were dubbed the “Golden Girls”. Many detractors called their win a fluke but
they repeated that feat the next year in the Sydney Olympics.
The success continues. Just last year sprinter Chandra Sturrup won the 60m at the IAAF World Indoor Championships in Lisbon, Portugal. At the World Outdoor in Edmonton, Canada, Avard Moncur won the Gold in the 400m with Debbie Ferguson winning a silver medal in the 200m, and the team of Moncur, Troy McIntosh, Carl Oliver, Chris Brown, and Tim Munnings winning the silver medal in the 1600m relay.
Significant administrative change got underway at the Annual General Meeting in November of 2001. The Association adopted a new constitution, new structure, and a new name, the Bahamas Association of Athletics Associations. Just as the international body had eliminated the term “amateur” from its name our local body followed suit.
Strong, exemplary and dedicated leadership has been the hallmark of the association over the years. Since 1952 there have been some twelve presidents. The founding president Alfred F. Adderley, was a brilliant lawyer. A year later he died on the airplane while returning to Nassau from the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II in 1953. Subsequent presidents were: Cyril “Cap” Richardson, Harold Munnings, Levi Gibson, Hon. Paul Adderley, the son of the founding president, Sir Arlington Butler, Rev. Enoch Backford, Winston Cooper, Dr. Bernard Nottage, Alpheus Finlayson, Foster Dorsett, and current president Thomas Desmond Bannister.
Based upon it’s small population, currently just over three hundred thousand, the success of the Bahamas in world events has been more than fantastic. At an exhibition put on at City Hall in Stuttgart during the 1993 IAAF World Championships, the Bahamas was labeled “Small Country Great Athletes”.
Easter of this year saw the sixth hosting by the federation of the Annual Carifta Games. The Bahamas finished second in the overall medal count. IAAF president Lamine Diack was in attendance making him the first IAAF president to visit the Bahamas and the first IAAF president to attend the Carifta Games.
Last year the Bahamas hosted the Central American and Caribbean Age Group Championships in Freeport, Grand Bahama. This was significant for two reasons. Firstly, this was the first time that an international event was held at a venue outside of the capital, Nassau. Secondly, the Bahamian team won the event.
The success of these two international meets hosted in the Bahamas is a continuation of the success of the Bahamas Track and Field program over the years. It has also laid a solid foundation for future success.
