Travel back in time and discover what was happening this week in our wrestling heritage
Tim Cook is the grandson of 1928 Olympian Robert Cook. Tim tells the story of his own Olympic goal, to follow the footsteps of his famous grandfather.
In April, 2012, I decided to discover more about my grandfather’s wrestling career, despite only knowing that he had represented GB at the 1928 Olympics in Amsterdam.
Fortunately I was put in contact with Allan Best at the BWA archives, and he rapidly increased my small collection of memorabilia and pictures. However he had gaps in his records and so it became necessary to search wider afield. Suddenly I was spending upwards of forty hours a week searching on the internet, contacting people in places such as France and Holland (thank God for Google translator) trying to find out about his international career.
It was amazing to find that there is so little centrally documented evidence of the amateur/professional wrestlers of the early 1900s, despite a wealth of information on them surviving in newspaper archives, or with specialist collectors/websites.
After learning a great deal I decided to take a trip to Amsterdam to take in the experience of the recently restored Olympic Stadium (and museum). My brother and I made our way to Holland (from Norway and Sweden respectively) arriving on 27th July, and prepared ourselves to celebrate the 84th anniversary of the opening ceremony on Saturday 28th.
We walked the five kilometres to the Stadium from our hotel (nearer ten after getting lost), and saw the real Amsterdam on the way. It is a friendly and very pretty city away from the infamous tourist attractions, a real gem that I would suggest anyone make the effort to visit.
Arriving at the Olympische Stadion at 1:50pm, it was occupied by excited children undertaking a specially organised Olympic challenge. However at 2pm, the exact time the team procession had begun 84 years previously, it suddenly emptied and went quiet.
Standing there on the running track it seemed smaller than I expected, minute in comparison to the Olympic stadium in London. The art deco friezes and 1930s construction provided a glimpse of what our grandfather and his team mates must have seen (without the 30,000 plus crowd), and for the first time I began to feel a real connection with him.
I won’t lie and say that I didn’t get goose bumps, or feel emotional standing there. I did. I had never known much about wrestling before this journey; it was always boxing for me. However that has changed for me now, the dedication and skill required to wrestle, to physically dominate and out-perform another human being in an intelligent manner is far more impressive.
Back home in rainy Norway I now want to dedicate some time to ensuring that the likes of Harold Sansum, Harold Angus, George MacKenzie, Robert Cook, Sam Rabin and Bernard Rowe (and others) are not forgotten. I will just mention that in this day and age sites such as Wrestling Heritage are capable of ensuring that they are not, and should be thanked for the dedication they display in doing what they do.
I never met my grandfather, but through some very special individuals I have got to know him a lot better.
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