Stanley Vivian BACON

Stanley Bacon was the eldest and most successful of five brothers who were in the top-flight of British wrestling for more than a decade. Between them, the Bacon brothers won almost 30 British championships, with Stanley winning 15 titles. To reach the middleweight freestyle final at the 1908 Games, Stanley Bacon defeated three British wrestlers and then met a fourth Briton, George de Relwyskow, in the final. The two were very evenly matched, but Bacon won the first two bouts on points, after the expiration of the fifteen-minute time limit and the scheduled third bout was not contested. He also competed in the Greco-Roman middleweight event in 1908, but lost in the first round and in 1912, when there were no freestyle events, he again suffered an early defeat in the Greco-Roman style competition. At the 1920 Olympics, his third, he returned to the freestyle events, but he was by now 35 years old and lost his first bout. Bacon was a civil servant and an enthusiastic supporter of their sports club. He was the Civil Service diving and middleweight boxing champion and played rugby for their first XV for ten years. He was held in high regard in wrestling circles and was a judge at the 1928 Olympic Games.