A Confession?

[a massive zebra]

A decadal dig. Impressive.

Featuring a post from fredfertang's very first month on the forum!

 

[trundler]

Curious and would love to be educated. How were professionals and amateurs treated differently?

 

[Burgey]

WG's estate had a gross value for probate purposes of just £7,278 - he rented his home - wonder what the old bugger spent it all on?

Hookers and blow.

 

[stephen]

By comparison, the house I live in now had a material value of 88 pounds in 1902. And it was one of the fancier ones - a 3 bedroom plus attached kitchen!

 

[wpdavid]

Curious and would love to be educated. How were professionals and amateurs treated differently?

Different sides of the changing rooms maybe.

And their names were shown differently on scorecards. Famously 'Titmus FJ' instead of 'FJ Titmus'.

 

[a massive zebra]

By comparison, the house I live in now had a material value of 88 pounds in 1902. And it was one of the fancier ones - a 3 bedroom plus attached kitchen!

Interesting. It is a little strange to hear second team players could earn enough money to buy a fairly comfortable house in just one year, but I guess basic essentials such as food, water, clothes and transport may have been relatively more expensive back then. Also, house prices and wages may have been lower in Australia than in England at the time.

 

[a massive zebra]

Some more context I found online:

The average annual salary in the UK today is around £26,000, for working a 40 hour week. In 1910 it was around £70 for men and £30 for women (the equivalent of £6,500 and £2,800 today) for working a 55 hour week. Skilled workers, such as iron-moulders and cotton mill overlookers, could earn over £100 (£9,400) per year; unskilled labourers might only earn half that.

Housing was much cheaper. In 1910 a 3 bedroom house could be rented for around £15 (£1,400) per year, compared to around £7,000 per year today. Buying a house was also, in theory, more affordable. In reality, banks were far more choosy about who they lent to; the maximum loan was usually 75% of the house’s value and the repayment period was typically 16-20 years. Most working people in the first half of the 20th century rented rather than owned; a 25% deposit would have been beyond their means, and anyway, many regarded a mortgage as an unwanted millstone around their necks.

While property prices and rents have rocketed ahead of earnings over the last 100 years, mass production and modern transportation have meant that food and luxury goods are now much more affordable for those on average incomes. In 1910 the amount of money that average workers had left over for rent or house purchase was tiny because so much was dedicated just to paying for food; as much as 75% of a weekly wage could go on groceries. Wars and economic crises throughout the 20th century meant that luxury goods remained a rare treat that families saved hard for. Even as late as the 1970s, large luxury goods such as televisions tended to be rented rather than bought outright by those on average incomes.

To compare the changing cost of goods against wages, I have picked the examples of a police constable and a staff nurse; their pay has hovered around the national average for the last 100 years. For the household goods, I have tried to highlight a ‘lineal ancestor’ to the modern items we know today. For example, while televisions weren’t invented in 1910, a hand cranked ‘mutoscope’ could have provided a moving picture show in the home, and while Atari video games were all the rage in 1977, the Edwardians were going mad for table tennis, or ‘ping pong’ in 1910. Also, some items such as the radio receiver in 1910, the television in 1938, or the personal computer in 1977 were still very new and experimental, so a very high initial cost to the consumer was to be expected. I have put today’s equivalent cost against the old time prices, so you can see the effect that government legislation and market forces have had on them over the years.

Average annual salaries in 1910:

Police Constable £80
Staff Nurse £40

Average house price £250
Average car price £220
Bicycle £15.75
Telephone £3.15
Radio £1.50
Camera £1.05
Watch £1.25

Single boat ticket from England to South Africa 1st class £28.35 2nd class £23.10

 

[fredfertang]

Featuring a post from fredfertang's very first month on the forum!

I see I was a bit of a **** even then

 

[a massive zebra]

Curious and would love to be educated. How were professionals and amateurs treated differently?

Amateur cricketers were (in theory) not paid for playing cricket, but they could claim travel and accommodation expenses for away matches. Professionals, on the other hand, were talented cricketers who were paid for playing the game and relied on cricket for their living.

Amateurs, coming mostly from the upper and upper-middle classes, were considered the elite of cricket, while professionals came mostly from the working classes. The classification became entrenched when the first Gentlemen versus Players match was played on July 7, 1806 at Lord’s. The Gentlemen side was made up of the leading amateurs and the Players side was made up of the leading professionals. An interesting social feature of these matches was the way the players addressed each other. Gentlemen addressed Players by their surnames, but the Players were supposed to address the Gentlemen as ‘Sir’. The custom stretched to matches when these cricketers played alongside each other, and even outside the arena.

The professional cricketers, being good enough to be selected on merit, paid for their services and reliant on cricket for their livelihood, were almost invariably the more talented cricketers. Despite this, former amateurs led the county clubs, usually taking on the senior positions of secretary and president. The amateurs got superior travel and boarding facilities for away matches and overseas tours, separate dressing-rooms and often separate gates onto the field of play.

To give an idea of the social divisions of the time, A.G. Gardiner wrote in A Visitor to The Oval in 1924:

On Monday, we had several bad shocks to our sense of the solemnities of cricket. We saw Fender, the Surrey Captain lead the ‘gentlemen’ members of his team to the professionals’ quarters and bring his team out into the field in a body, just for all the world as though they were all flesh and blood. It was a painful sight, and many of us closed our eyes rather than look upon it. We felt that Bolshevism had invaded our sanctuary at last.

It was not that the professionals were complaining. In the 1890s, top England players like George Lohmann were earning over £500 per year at a time when the national average wage for male workers was about £70. In the 1920s, Jack Hobbs earned over £1,500 per annum while the national average wage for men was about £200. Perhaps not as lucrative as current centrally contracted Australian, English, or Indian players with IPL contracts, but more than sufficient to live a very affluent life.

The perception of amateurs as officers and gentlemen, and thereby leaders, meant that most county sides had an amateur captain. This often led to a team of 10 competent professionals being led by a far lesser cricketer who made the side purely because he was an amateur. A perfect example of this was Sir Arthur Grey Hazlerigg, who later became First Baron Hazlerigg. Hazlerigg led Leicestershire from 1907 to 1910: he had averaged 10.82 with the bat from 108 innings, scored one fifty, and had bowled just over 10 overs in 65 matches. Another, second lieutenant Arthur Lupton, captained Yorkshire between 1925 and 1927: he averaged 10.34 with the bat from 88 innings with a highest score of 43 not out.

However, in some county elevens such as the Yorkshire team of the 1920s, a ridiculous situation arose in which the de facto on field captain was the senior professional (Wilfred Rhodes in this case) and the nominal amateur captain who offered almost no cricketing skills merely "did what he was told". So the Yorkshire “captain” was keeping a far more skilled professional out of the side in order to lead a side that he did not actually lead!

Some middle class cricketers who did not want the social stigma of being a professional could not afford to play cricket regularly for free. A few of those who were good enough cricketers to represent their county became shamateurs: cricketers who were nominally amateurs and enjoyed all the social perks of amateur status, but who were indirectly paid for their cricket. Walter Read of Surrey was a prime example. In the 1880s, he was appointed by Surrey as Assistant Secretary on an annual salary of £250-£300 with a guaranteed annual bonus of £50-£100. In reality, there was never any question of this position involving any work, and it was merely a front for Surrey to retain the services of their star batsmen and for Walter Read to retain his privileged status as an amateur. Shamateur contracts were never offered to working class players.

A professional cricketer leading England was totally out of the question. Lord Hawke, eight times championship winning captain and later president of Yorkshire, once said “Pray God, no professional shall ever captain England.” It was not until 1952 that Len Hutton became the first professional to captain England in the 20th century.

 

[a massive zebra]

Some middle class cricketers who did not want the social stigma of being a professional could not afford to play cricket regularly for free. A few of those who were good enough cricketers to represent their county became shamateurs: cricketers who were nominally amateurs and enjoyed all the social perks of amateur status, but who were indirectly paid for their cricket. Walter Read of Surrey was a prime example. In the 1880s, he was appointed by Surrey as Assistant Secretary on an annual salary of £250-£300 with a guaranteed annual bonus of £50-£100. In reality, there was never any question of this position involving any work, and it was merely a front for Surrey to retain the services of their star batsmen and for Walter Read to retain his privileged status as an amateur. Shamateur contracts were never offered to working class players.

My apologies, I was away at the time of writing this post and the above paragraph was written from memory. Upon returning home and reviewing my sources, I appear to have slightly overstated Mr. Walter's Read's terms. Here is an extract from Ric Sissons book The Players:

Until 1897 he held the nominal position of assistant secretary at the Oval with a salary package as follows:

• £150 per annum.
• A railway season ticket to and from the Oval.
• Four guineas (£4.20) per match.
• An annual bonus of up to £100, proportional to the number of matches played.

In September 1896 the committee proposed to end the arrangement. Read replied that he was 'at a loss to understand why' and countered that his arrangement continue until 31 December 1897. The committee agreed and paid him off with the provisos, which he accepted, that he had no claim whatsoever on the job of assistant secretary and that he undertook to play in the Surrey first eleven fixtures in 1897 for no additional payment except travel and accommodation expenses for away matches.

It is obvious from the Surrey minutes and correspondence that there was never any question of Read working as assistant secretary. The payments to Read clearly contravened the MCC definition of an amateur, that "no gentlemen ought to make a profit from his services on the cricket field."

Even if Mr Read did work as assistant secretary, the third and fourth terms in his contract are clearly direct payments for services on the cricket field that should only be made to a professional cricketer.

It was not that the professionals were complaining. In the 1890s, top England players like George Lohmann were earning over £500 per year at a time when the national average wage for male workers was about £70.

Here are the terms of George Lohmann's "star contract" for 1892:

• A retaining fee of £100 per annum.
• £5 per home match and £6 per out (away) match.
• Win bonus: £1 bonus for each match won.
• Talent money: £1 per fifty, £2 per century, £1 for five wickets in an innings.
• An end of season bonus of £50 to be made a fixed and absolute payment.
• Total payments for 1892 would not be less than £350.

If we add on the money Lohmann would earn from home Test matches, Gentlemen vs Players matches, Ashes tours, endorsements and his eventual benefit, his annual earnings would have comfortably exceeded £500.

 

[wpdavid]

A professional cricketer leading England was totally out of the question. Lord Hawke, eight times championship winning captain and later president of Yorkshire, once said “Pray God, no professional shall ever captain England.” It was not until 1952 that Len Hutton became the first professional to captain England in the 20th century.

Wasn't there an instance of a professional standing in for an amateur to captain the test team before Hutton? Maybe in an overseas test, so technically it was the MCC?
Or maybe I'm making that up.

 

[a massive zebra]

Wasn't there an instance of a professional standing in for an amateur to captain the test team before Hutton? Maybe in an overseas test, so technically it was the MCC?
Or maybe I'm making that up.

I think Jack Hobbs captained England for one day in the 1926 Ashes after Arthur Carr was injured, but he never started a Test as designated captain.

There were several all-professional tours in the 1880s in which the team was of course captained by a professional. That is why I said "in the 20th century."

 

[AndrewB]

Hobbs stood in as captain for the last two days at Old Trafford in 1926 after Arthur Carr developed tonsillitis. I don't think any professional was officially appointed captain for a Test between Shrewsbury in 1887 and Hutton in 1952.

(Edit: hadn't seen amz's post when I wrote that)