Two South

They May Have

Pacific Games

By a Staff Reporter

There may be some hopping,

skipping and jumping in the

South Pacific soon if thz or

ganisers of two rival Pacific

Games don’t get together to see

what each plans to do. mHE would-be rivals are the X organisers of the proposed South Pacific Games and the Pan Pacific Games.

The South Pacific Games were proposed in Rabaul in 1959 at the fourth South Pacific Conference, which was organised by the South Pacific Commission. Delegates to the conference came from the six member nations of the South Pacific Commission, including the United States Trust Territory of the Pacific, and American Samoa.

The 21st Session of the South Pacific Commission in Noumea last October agreed to organise a con ference of Pacific Territories who might be interested in getting such a Games started. This conference will be held in Noumea in March.

Delegates will come from all parts of the South Pacific.

The Pan Pacific Games are to be held in Honolulu in July-August, and the organisers would like them to be held regularly every two years.

The SPC Games presumably would also be held regularly when they get started.

Wants Support

The leading light behind the Pan Pacific Games in Honolulu is Mrs.

E. Fullard-Leo, of Honolulu, a sportswriter on the Honolulu Ad vertiser, and a member of the family which owns Palmyra, in the Line Islands. She is on the Board of Gov ernors of the US Amateur Athletic Union, and secretary-treasurer of the Hawaiian association.

Mrs. Fullard-Leo was in Australia in January attending the Pan Pacific and South-east Asiq Women’s Con

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ference. While in Australia she took the opportunity to enlist some sup port for her Pan Pacific Games.

She saw, among others, Sir Harold Alderson, chairman of the Aus tralian Olympic Federation.

A meeting was held in Sydney during January, attended by Aus tralian officials and Mrs. Fullard- Leo. At the meeting, Mr. Eric Holford, who had met Mrs. Fullard- Leo in Honolulu, when taking the Australian rowing team to the Rome Olympics, was appointed liaison officer between the various interested bodies.

However, it is doubtful if Aus tralia would send an official team to the Pan Pacific Games, as the facilities would not be up to inter national standard.

Training Ground

Mrs. Fullard-Leo had hoped the Australians would make use of her Games to limber up for the British Empire Games in Perth in 1962 and, of course, the Olympic Games in Japan in 1964.

Mrs. Fullard-Leo said that accord ing to the constitution written by her, the Games would be open to countries bordering the Pacific be tween longitude 70 degrees west and 11 R rtPOTPPC pp cf, Which means Fijian athletes might find themselves face to face with an Alaskan, not to mention a South Korean, Chilian, Filipino, Aus tralian and an inscrutable oriental from Taiwan.

Things being what they are to day (the Russians are entering horses in the British Grand National) there is every likelihood of someone rolling up from Kam chatka (Russia), which also hap pens to come into the area covered by the Hawaii-organised Pan Pacific Games. , , .

Hawaii, surprisingly, has no sports

stadium but Mrs. Fullard-Leo said that the US Army forces in Hawaii would provide facilities for the Games.

Every Two Years She hopes that her Games will be held every two years, and that this will stimulate the Hawaiians into building a stadium or two.

A feature of the Games will be native canoe races, as well as the more traditional international sports, such as swimming and run ning.

Mrs. Fullard-Leo said she had raised the idea of the Games at the annual convention of the Amateur Athletic Union in Las Vegas last November, and Pacific coast dele gates had been very enthusiastic.

When members of the SPC dis cussed their South Pacific Games at their session in October they did not know of Mrs. Fullard-Leo’s plans, but no doubt the matter will be mentioned at the special March meeting.