Olympic and Hollywood Hero

India’s first Olympic medal was won by a Calcuttan, Norman Pritchard. India’s first Hollywood hero was also a Calcuttan, Norman Trevor. However, both the Normans happened to be the same individual.

Born in Calcutta of British parentage in 1875, Norman Pritchard studied at St Xavier’s School and College. Stayed at Lansdowne Road till 1915 and was in the thriving jute industry in Bengal around the late 19th century. An Indian national by birthright and citizenship.

At the Paris Olympiad of 1900 Pritchard won two silver medals, 200 metres flat race and 200 metres hurdles. Those days sportsmen went to Olympics on their own as there were no national organizations to select or fund them.

While at Calcutta Xavier’s, he was an outstanding football player as well, achieving the first hat-trick in India. He was also the IFA secretary for a period.

One of my own gurus, the late lamented Cecil Leeming a priest of English parentage at Calcutta St.Xavier’s, always maintained that he would never have considered himself to be anything but a ‘pucca’ Bengali, “My dad used to say that Pritchard loved his luchees, kawsha-mangsho and misti-doi. A typical Bong he was!”

Later Pritchard went off to Britain to act in Shakespearean dramas on the London stage, where he changed his name to Norman Trevor. Here too he was an immediate success.

Next step was to be at Hollywood, where again his multi-faceted talents brought him the rare honour of being cast as a hero in numerous silent movies of those bygone days. Thus he became the first Indian to be a Hollywood film hero.

Thus he achieved the unique fame of being the first Olympian medalist to become a Hollywood movie hero. Unfortunately his over-exuberant life style led him into penury and worse. Expired in 1929.

Unfortunately film historians in India have never given this man his due recognition. No one in the film circles seems to have heard of him! The worlds of sports and films in modern India have no time for their own history and heritage. Pathetic scenario indeed! Old folks are best left buried…

 The name of Norman Pritchard should be written in letters of gold in the annals of Indian sport and movie history.