Our extensive and envied collection of Olympic material has received a further boost, following the donation of items relating to Australia’s Olympic diving gold medallist, Richmond “Dick” Eve.
Eve was the first Australian diver to win an Olympic gold medal when he triumphed in the plain high diving at the 1924 Games in Paris. That record stood for 80 years, until Chantelle Newberry was successful in the women’s platform in Athens in 2004.
Among the 41 items donated by Eve’s daughter-in-law, Joyce, is the gold medal itself – along with a participation medal from the same Olympics, three gold medals from the 1924 Tailteann Games in Ireland and a variety of winner’s medals from domestic diving events in the UK, USA and Australia.
The Dick Eve story is fascinating. His father managed Sydney’s Manly Baths and then Spit Baths, and it was reportedly at these venues that Eve taught himself the discipline of diving. His mother was a member of the Cavill family, who played a significant role in the development of swimming coaching in Australia and the USA.
Eve and his brothers, Jim and Allan, won a variety of swimming and diving titles, while Jim served as honorary secretary-treasurer of the Australian Olympic Federation for more than 20 years.
Despite winning Australia’s first official diving championship in 1921, Eve was not well known when he arrived in Paris for the 1924 Olympics. Dogged by ear trouble throughout his career, he had spent a full week in hospital before the championship at which he qualified for the Games.
He surprised many when he won the gold medal in the plain high diving, achieving a near-perfect score on the final dive to claim victory. He also finished fifth in the three-metre springboard event.
A year after the Olympics, he accepted a job as manager of the Manly Baths and was stripped of his amateur status. Several attempts were made to have him reinstated, but all were resisted by authorities. The loss of his amateur status prevented him from being considered for the 1928 Amsterdam Olympics and thus a career was finished.
While there are no definitive plans at this stage, one can imagine Eve’s historic Olympic medal may find its way into a National Sports Museum display as we head into an Olympic year. Keep an eye out on your next visit.
