Talk:List of sporting knights and dames

Categorisation issue with sporting knights generally
Three days ago I raised a question at Wikipedia talk:Categories for discussion/Archive 2009. It’s yet to receive any responses, so we’ll wait and see.

But looking around, I see it’s a wider issue. On List of knighted cricketers, we have
 * C. Aubrey Smith, Murray Bisset and Learie Constantine are amongst Test cricketers who were awarded knighthoods other than for their services to cricket.

That’s a good note; it explains why they’re not in the main list. It could also mention Frederick Toone. But I see that Constantine, Smith and Toone are in Category:Cricketing knights, where Bisset is not. That may just be an oversight, or it may have been a conscious decision not to put him in the category, because his knighthood was not related to cricket.

It highlights the general question: where a sportsperson (of any kind) is knighted (or damed), but for reasons other than their sporting achievements, is it appropriate to consider them "cricketing knights", "sporting knights" etc for categorization purposes?

Then there’s a slightly different question: such a person may not qualify as a "cricketing knight", for example, but could still qualify to go into a "List of knighted cricketers". That’s because he was a cricketer who was in fact knighted. The reason for the knighthood seems less relevant in this case.

What I’m getting at is that there is not necessarily a 1-to-1 correspondence between the people in the "Cricketing knights" category and the people in the "List of knighted cricketers". And also for the sportspersons generally. Or is there?

Maybe this is just semantics, but it seems something worth thinking about so that we’re all agreed what the qualifications for the category are, and what the qualifications for the lists are, if they're not the same thing. I’d welcome comments. -- JackofOz (talk) 00:02, 5 February 2009 (UTC)


 * The issue has now been settled @ Wikipedia talk:Categories for discussion/Archive 2009. The category now has a note explaining its scope, and the lists would also reflect the same scope.  --  JackofOz (talk) 00:45, 7 February 2009 (UTC)

Norman Brookes
Norman Brookes was knighted not explicitly for anything to do with tennis, but "in recognition of service to public service". However, the only thing we mention that had nothing to do with tennis was "During World War I he served as commissioner of the Australian branch of the British Red Cross in Egypt", which I can't see being knighthood material. His knighthood was granted in 1939, 20 years after the end of WW1. So I'm guessing that the citation was some bureaucrat's overly formal and clumsy attempt at avoiding stating the obvious - it was principally in recognition of his many services to tennis. I'll make a new Tennis section and add him in. -- JackofOz (talk) 04:31, 7 February 2009 (UTC)

Lord Wakefield
Wavell Wakefield, 1st Baron Wakefield of Kendal - it's not clear exactly what his knighthood and peerage were in recognition of, but his sporting career seems to be the most significant thing in his life. His political career was only 10 years, hardly even knighthood material let alone peerage. -- ♬  Jack of Oz  ♬  [your turn]  12:39, 3 June 2012 (UTC)

Knighted swimmers: Frank Beaurepaire?
We don't seem to have any knighted swimmers. The closest I know of is Sir Frank Beaurepaire. He had a major swimming career, breaking 15 world records. He won 3 silvers and 3 bronzes at 3 Olympics (1908, 1920, 1924). He was a swimming official and judge at the 1932 Olympics.

Then he went into business, and later into politics. He was elected Lord Mayor of Melbourne in 1940, and knighted in 1942. His citation mentions only his lord mayoralty. But two years as Lord Mayor is not normally anywhere near enough to earn a knighthood, and I'm supposing his enormous public profile from his swimming career and his tyre business helped more than a bit to get him over the line.

Anyone know any more about this? --  Jack of Oz   [Talk]  05:52, 13 October 2012 (UTC)

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