Bernarr Prendergast
| Personal information | ||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nationality | British / Jamaican | |||||||||||
| Born | 25 December 1911 Kingston, Jamaica | |||||||||||
| Died | 30 October 1966 (aged 54) Kingston, Jamaica | |||||||||||
| Sport | ||||||||||||
| Sport | Athletics | |||||||||||
| Event | discus | |||||||||||
| Club | St. Mary's Hospital, London | |||||||||||
Medal record
| ||||||||||||
Bernarr Leopold Sandow Prendergast (25 December 1911 – 30 October 1966)[1] was a British/Jamaican track and field athlete who competed for Great Britain in the 1936 Summer Olympics.[2]
Biography
[edit]Born in Kingston, Jamaica, Prendergast was of British descent. He studied medicine in London, at St Mary's Hospital Medical School, from 1933 to 1942.[3][2]
Prendergast won a bronze medal in the men's discus throw competition at the 1934 British Empire Games in London represting Jamaica.
Prendergast won the British AAA Championships title in the discus event at the 1936 AAA Championships.[4][5][6]
One month later he was selected to represent Great Britain at the 1936 Olympic Games held in Berlin because Jamaica had no participation in the Games at the time.[1] In the discus throw event he did not qualify for the final, and his exact result is unknown. He had a personal best of 44.16 m (144 ft 10+1⁄2 in).[2][7]
While training for the 1934 Empire Games, Prendergast was involved in an accident involving a javelin that caused an injury to a Japanese athlete called Sadako Yamamoto who was training for the World Games. The incident at the White City Stadium distressed Prendergast to the point that he initially withdrew from the 1934 Games.[8]
References
[edit]- ^ a b "Bernarr Prendergast". Olympedia. Retrieved 20 March 2022.
- ^ a b c "Bernard Prendergast", Sports Reference. Accessed 26 May 2016.
- ^ Phillips, Bob. Honour of Empire, Glory of Sport: The History of Athletics at the Commonwealth Games, p. 19 (Parrs Wood, 2000).
- ^ "AAA Championships begin". Western Mail. 11 July 1936. Retrieved 18 January 2025 – via British Newspaper Archive.
- ^ "Wooderson wins again". Daily Herald. 13 July 1936. Retrieved 18 January 2025 – via British Newspaper Archive.
- ^ "AAA, WAAA and National Championships Medallists". National Union of Track Statisticians. Retrieved 18 January 2025.
- ^ Bertram, Arnold (18 February 2012). "Jamaica's Road to the Olympics - Part III". The Gleaner. Jamaica. Retrieved 1 April 2019.
- ^ "Girl stabbed by javelin". Daily Express. 2 August 1934. Retrieved 18 January 2025 – via British Newspaper Archive.
External links
[edit]
   | This biographical article relating to British athletics is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. |
- 1911 births
- 1966 deaths
- Athletes from Kingston, Jamaica
- British male discus throwers
- Jamaican male discus throwers
- Olympic athletes for Great Britain
- Athletes (track and field) at the 1936 Summer Olympics
- Commonwealth Games bronze medallists for Jamaica
- Commonwealth Games medallists in athletics
- Athletes (track and field) at the 1934 British Empire Games
- Jamaican people of British descent
- Medallists at the 1934 British Empire Games
- 20th-century Jamaican sportsmen
- British athletics biography stubs