Sport and Colonialism in 19th Century Australasia - LA84 Foundation

and moods of his own day and not against any modern ideas and
contemporary conventions. What he said and did early in the
twentieth century appeared less overstated and colourful in
those days than they seem today, or even in 1930. Darling was
obviously disappointed that the schools had not seriously considered
their role in the community and felt that a social obligation
held greater priority than any commitment to sport. Yet
social obligation had much less need of projection in Australia
than it had in England.
The defence of Adamson against Darling's charges could
mount an impressive case. The games cult that the Wesley head
engendered, and Led, can hardly be conceived of, or rated, as a
vice. An anti-intellectualism never appears to have operated
at Wesley or at any of the other public schools, and Adamson was
extremely careful to ensure that every boy who gained athletic
success kept his feet on the ground. There was hero worship of
the athlete at Wesley but the tight hold Adamson kept on all
sporting proceedings did not allow for the over-bloated inflation
of the successful athlete. Adamson was always aware of the
wrong values that "over-athleticism" could spawn. The 1910 conference
was also an opportunity for all of the schools to draw
back from any excessive interest in games, yet there was unanimous
agreement that the trends in sport and in competition were
of no undue concern. In any case, games as part of public
school education had been given, more or less, a national seal
of approval in 1909. James Lee-Pulling, senior master at Sydney
Church of England Grammar School, writing on "Sport in Relation
to School Life" in the Australian Journal of Education, emphatically
endorsed the games system in the public schools because it was
invested with "moral tone" and gave masters the opportunity to
influence the formation of character in boys. 67
But it is also
doubtful to blame Adamson for the keen interest in games still
evident in the Victorian schools as late as 1930. Australian
public schools continued to take their cues from the trends set
in the English public schools during the 1920s, and in the
aftermath of the Great War, the games cult in the mother country
"had risen to a crescendo". 68
Darling's complaints of Adamson
and his educational doctrine of "strenuousness and sentiment" are
60