Barbara Holliday

Barbara Holliday
Personal information
Full nameBarbara Cecilia Mary Holliday
Born1908 (1908)
Died1968(1968-00-00) (aged 59–60)
Sport
CountryUnited Kingdom
SportTrack and field athletics
Event(s)Long jump, high jump, running
Medal record
Women's athletics
Representing  United Kingdom
Women's World Games
Bronze medal – third place1926 Gothenburgstanding long jump

Barbara Cecilia Mary Holliday after marriage Barbara Gray (1908 - 1968) was a British track and field athlete specialized in the long jump and high jump during the 1920s, the early era of women's athletics.[1] In the standing long jump she was world record holder and bronze medalist at the second Women's World Games in 1926.

Biography

Career

In June 1921, when she was 14-years old, she competed in Manchester in a 15-mile race walk described as the "girls' first annual walking championship". She finished second in a time of 2 hours 2min and 28sec, behind the 15-year-old Lillian Salkeld.[2]

In 1926 she competed at the 1926 Great Britain Women's World Games trials where she won the high jump event and finished second in the standing long jump. As a result she qualified to represent the United Kingdom at the 1926 Women's World Games in Gothenburg.[3] She won the bronze medal in the standing long jump event with a jump of 2.37 metres behind Japanese Kinue Hitomi and Czechoslovak Zdena Smolová.[4][5]

On 20 July 1927, she improved the world record in the standing long jump with 2.57 meters during a competition in London.[6]

Personal life

Holliday was born in 1908 and lived in Moss Side, Manchester.[1][2] She married Scottish general practitioner James Gray and lived in Hayling Island in Hampshire county.[7][8] The couple had 2 children: Nigel Gray and playwright, memoirist and university lecturer Simon Gray (1936–2008).[7][9] Holliday-Gray died in 1968.[10]

References

  1. 1 2 "Daisy Crossley". Brinkster. Retrieved 4 September 2024.
  2. 1 2 "The factory girl who was one of the first British women sprinters of renown". National Union of Track Statisticians. Retrieved 5 September 2024.
  3. ↑ "Pour Les Jeux féminins de Gothebourg | L'equipe Anglaise". La Dernière Heure (in French). 10 August 1926. p. 4.
  4. ↑ "Les Jeux Mondiaux féminins de Gothebourg". La Dernière Heure (in French). 31 August 1926. p. 4.
  5. ↑ Svenska dagbladets Årsbok 1926 (in Swedish). Stockholm: Svenska Dagbladet. 1927. p. 217-218. Retrieved 13 June 2024 – via runeberg.org.
  6. ↑ "British World Record breakers". British Athletics. Retrieved 4 September 2024.
  7. 1 2 "Simon Gray". simongray.org.uk.
  8. ↑ "Simon Gray". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Archived from the original on 2015-12-22. Retrieved 2024-09-05.
  9. ↑ "Simon Gray". Roundabout Theatre Company. Archived from the original on 2015-06-09. Retrieved 2024-09-05.
  10. ↑ "Barbara Cecilia Mary Holliday". ancestry.co.uk. Retrieved 5 September 2024.