By Spiro Zavos
August 8th 2008 @ 6:08am
Dan Carroll: rugby’s greatest Olympian
The well-informed Olympics fan will probably know the answer to the question of which Australians won gold medals at three successive Games?
Shirley de la Hunty (nee Strickland) at the Games of 1952, 1956 and 1960 is one correct answer. Dawn Fraser, in the 100m swimming in 1956,1960 and 1964, is another.
But what about Dan Carroll?
He was involved in a gold medal for Rugby in 1908 as Wallaby, then as the player-coach of the successful American side in 1920. And at the Paris Games in 1924, he coached the successful American side.
The 1924 Olympics was Pierre de Coubertin’s swansong and the IOC rewarded him by taking rugby off the list of Olympic sports, even though rugby was Coubertin’s favourite game (he refereed the first French club championship final in 1892) and it was his passionate belief that rugby was the epitome of an Olympic sport.
In much the same way that rugby has been treated poorly by the Olympic movement (it’s ludicrous that synchronised swimming, for instance, is in the Games), so too has the memory of Dan Carroll
been blotted out of Australia’s Olympic folklore.
Perhaps this is unduly defensive on my part, but the fact that Carroll’s first gold medal was won when the Wallabies defeated Cornwall-England in 1908 may have something to do with his lack of fame.
Among the Sydney journalistic community, particularly, it’s been fashionable since 1908 to dismiss rugby union as a rah rah sport that is somehow slightly un-Australian.
Harry Gordon in his magisterial book ‘Australia and the Olympic Games’ virtually dismisses Carroll’s second gold medal in this way: “Ironically, the only gold Australian to carry away a gold medal from the 1920 Olympics was Dan Carroll, the playing coach of the American team and a former winger with the Wallabies.”
Note to Harry Gordon: you should have mentioned that Carroll was the first Australian to win two Olympic gold medals.
Dan Carroll was educated at St Aloysius College and Sydney University, where he studied dentistry.
He was the youngest player in the 1908 Australian side to tour Britain, which was given the nickname of The Wallabies.
He was a quicksilver winger who was clocked at ‘evens’ in the 100 yards as a schoolboy.
Most of this side defected to rugby league when they got back to Australia. Dr Herbert Moran, the team’s captain and later a Macquarie Street cancer specialist, and Carroll, were exceptions.
In 1912 Carroll was selected to tour California with an Australian side which defeated All-America 12-8. The American newspapers, aware of Australia’s Olympic gold medal, dubbed the visitors “the world champions of rugby.”
Carroll stayed on at Stanford University where he took a degree in geology in 1920.
He played for All-America against the All Blacks in 1913, a Test won by NZ 51-3, a scoreline that is said to have killed off interest in rugby as an American sport.
He served in the American Army in the First World War and went on to play, despite having been wounded, for the Australian Army in the King’s Cup tournament (a mini-Rugby World Cup) in 1919.
The ARU Archives have some documents on Carroll, including some correspondence conducted by his niece with the US Army Reserve Personnel Command concerning the whereabouts of his Dinstinguished Service Cross won during the First World War.
The ARPC confirmed that Carroll had married in Montana in 1927, had one son Daniel – who is deceased – and that his wife Helen died in 1941.
There are some sad sentences at the end of the correspondence: “We believe D.B.Carroll remarried and lived in San Bernardino. However, family in Australia had his last known address in New Orleans. Date of death 1956/7 (?).”
A hundred years on from his first Olympic triumph, it is surely time to rescue Dan Carroll’s story from oblivion.
He should be honoured as a truly great Australian sports hero, the nation’s first to win two Olympic gold medals.
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Steffy said | August 8th 2008 @ 8:15am | Report comment
Rugby union at the Olympics was a bit of a joke though; the teams weren’t usually national teams, just whoever could be bothered making an appearance, the sport was dropped because of that and violence at a game.
JohnB said | August 8th 2008 @ 9:24am | Report comment
Spiro, hate to be picky but Edwin Flack won 2 golds in 1896, and there were Olympics in Stockholm in 1912 so Dan Carroll did not win gold (counting coaching a winning side as “winning gold”) at 3 successive Olympics. At the 3 he competed at, yes (counting the coaching), at 3 successive, no.
Blind Freddy said | August 8th 2008 @ 11:49am | Report comment
Oh c’mon Spiro, you’re gilding the rugby lily just a trifle too much with this one.
Carroll was at ONE Olympic Games representing Australia, not three.
By your logic, Austalia can lay claim to not only every Olympic medal won by Australia (including all the imported Aussies like Tatiana Grigorieva), but also every Olympic medal won by every ex-pat Aussie for any other country in the world.
I’m thankful that Enrique “Topo” Rodriguez retired from the Wallabies before they won the 1991 World Cup, otherwise Spiro would have us sharing the trophy with Argentina.
Cliff - Bishkek said | August 8th 2008 @ 3:02pm | Report comment
Spiro you are pushing the statistics truth a little bi far – BUT – a great story.
It would be an interesting article if some “journalist” could reasearch and discover the STORY of Dan Carroll’s life. Seems as if it would make for interesting reading.
Dublin Dave said | August 17th 2008 @ 10:06pm | Report comment
With a little bit of pedantry you could ask the question which Australian won three Olympic golds without ever having represented Australia?
Carroll would be your man (even though I doubt he actually won three if he was only the coach of USA in 1924. Do coaches get medals?)
The fact is that Australia did not participate in the 1908 Olympics. Instead it was part of a wider team called Australasia which included New Zealand. Although to be fair, the rugby team was made up entirely of Australians. Just as the Great Britain team that it defeated was represented by Cornwall.
Saying Australia won gold in 1908 is a little like saying that the likes of David Wilkie and Alan Wells won gold medals for Scotland. They didn’t. They won for the UK.
Spiro Zavos said | August 17th 2008 @ 10:40pm | Report comment
I take Dublin Dave’s point. In my book on the history of the Wallabies, The Golden Wallabies, I make the tongue-in-cheek suggestion that NZ should claim half of the Wallabies gold medal on the grounds that the competing team represented Australasin, not Australia.
I can’t find any NZ officials to press the point, and I can’t understand why they don’t.
Frederic Humbert said | July 29th 2009 @ 9:05pm | Report comment
commenting one later later… better late than never…
I’ve found your interesting paper while googling for Dan Carroll : I’ve posted some pictures of him in 1908, 1920 and 1924 on my website : http://bit.ly/HjrPf
Thanks !