Today's Object of the Week is an item of sporting memorabilia - with a spelling mistake.
Items from the glittering international career of an Olympic, European and Commonwealth swimming champion are to go under the hammer in an auction in North Yorkshire following her decision sort out her collection.
Anita Lonsbrough was a British Empire and Commonwealth Games double gold medallist – but incredibly Team GB still got her name wrong.
When the 19-year-old swimmer arrived in Rome for the 1960 Summer Olympics she was issued with an official Team GB towelling robe, labelled ‘A. Lonsborough’. Nice personalised touch – apart from the fact that her name was Lonsbrough not Lonsborough.
Anita wore the robe at the Stadio Olimpico del Nuoto in Rome on Saturday, August 27 - after which date few people would get her name wrong.
That was the evening the office clerk made history when she won gold in the 200 metres breaststroke – and set a new world record.
Her gold medal was one of only two taken home by the British team from the Rome Olympics - and the last time a British woman swimmer would win an Olympic gold medal for 48 years.
Anita was philosophical about the ‘Lonsborough’ howler.
"A lot of people struggled with the name," she said. "But not so much after the Olympic gold medal.”
The Team GB Olympics robe has remained amongst Anita's treasured memorabilia in a career that saw her win a total of seven gold medals at Commonwealth, European and Olympic levels, set five world records and become the first sportswoman to win the BBC Sports Personality of the Year.
Now in their 80s, Anita and her husband, the former world champion cyclist Hugh Porter, have decided that the time has come to thin out their treasures.
Although they live in Wolverhampton, Anita wanted to send her things home to Yorkshire – where she was based throughout her competitive swimming career – and asked Scarborough auctioneers David Duggleby to handle it for them.
The collection entered in the auction includes her very first tracksuit top, a present from her parents when she started competitive swimming, and the team-issue swimming costume in which Anita shot to prominence in the 1958 British Empire and Commonwealth Games - so primitive the material actually slowed down the swimmers.
The Rome Olympics has contributed the blue tracksuit that Anita wore on the podium when she received the gold medal – as well as the ‘Lonsborough’ howler towelling robe.
Auctioneer Graham Paddison said: “Other items of memorabilia in this unique collection – which is to be sold as a single lot to keep it together - include her ‘lucky towel’ - the charm that was taken to every event.
Read about some previous Objects of the Week here:
- What's the story behind the name inscribed on blackened church stone?
- Weapons made out of bones used to hunt animals are discovered
- Why this North East terrace of brick built colliery houses is called Fairy Street
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"There are also souvenir programmes for the ‘Cavalcade of Sport’ celebration that was staged in Huddersfield after her Olympic win. They are rare and one of them bears her autographed, signed on the night.”
The catalogue for the Decorative Art & Collectors Auction is available online at davidduggleby.com.
Viewing will be taking place at the Vine Street Saleroom in Scarborough on Wednesday (May 31), Thursday (June 1) and on Friday, June 2 from 9am until the start of the auction at 11am.
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