If you drive along Bertrand Street in San Fernando, you might notice a set of weights in the front yard of a large but nondescript house. It’s the only sign that inside lives a man who once lifted 727 1/2 lbs - and the first Olympic medal for Trinidad and Tobago in 1948.
Sixty years later, Rodney Wilkes could only watch, perhaps with a pang of bitterness and hurt, as Prime Minister Patrick Manning, the MP for his area, opened the public purse and forked out millions of dollars to this year’s Olympic silver medallists.
In a drawer, hidden away and hardly ever brought out is Wilkes’ own silver medal, won in London after he lifted 699 3/4lbs.
The era was colonial; independence was still two decades away. There were few options for young black men in those days. At the invitation of the owner, a young Rodney Wilkes started weightlifting training at a gym in Navet. He was also a good runner, jumper, cricketer and footballer - he had to have been a very good baller, he reasons, to have played for the mostly white team at what was then Shell Trinidad.
’Weightlifting came naturally to me,’ he said. ’You see, my father was a carter man, and as a boy, I would have to cut grass for his two donkeys. I had to lift the bundle of grass to my knees, then up to my shoulder, then up over my head.’
Although not more than 5ft 5in - he would become known as the Mighty Midget - Wilkes was able to lift almost double his weight. As a featherweight contender in the Caribbean and Central American (CAC) Games in Barranquilla, Colombia, in 1946, just 21 years old, Wilkes won the gold medal by lifting 205lb (press), 210lb (snatch) and 275lb (clean and jerk) - an aggregate of 690lb.
What followed next was as baffling as it was brilliant: selected for the Summer Olympics in London in 1948, Wilkes suffered a broken thumb yet still managed to lift a total of 699 3/4lb. He went under to the Egyptian Mahmoud Fayad whose aggregate was an incredible 733lb, a new Olympic and world record. Nevertheless, Trinidad and Tobago, an unknown outpost in the British Empire, had won a silver medal.
But the era was colonial; the governors of the country and The Establishment had no real use for or interest in a black Olympic medallist. Wilkes was given a reception at City Hall, his hand was shaken, the local diginitaries talked and laughed politely - and that was it.
Undeterred and unfazed, Wilkes kept on training by himself; his assigned coach, Freddy Mendes, took little interest in him. ’What could I say about Freddy Mendes?’ said Wilkes. ’He was a white man.’ Indeed, Mendes once boasted, ’I have a dog eating better than him [referring to Wilkes].’
The Mighty Midget’s revenge for all the injustice and racism he endured was to win another gold medal in 1950 - at the CAC Games in Guatemala. The following year he took the top spot at the Pan American Games in Buenos Aires, Argentina. That year, Wilkes represented T&T again at the Olympics, in Helsinki, Finland, where he won the bronze medal.
In 1954 he was crowned British Empire champion in Vancouver, Canada.
In 1956, at his third Olympics, in Melbourne, Australia, despite suffering a slipped disc, he grossed 7271/2 lb, his best ever. But he placed fourth, as the winner; the American Isaac Berger, increased the Games record total to 777lb. ’There’s a story there,’ Wilkes said, but prefers to keep it to himself.
In 1960, aged 35, Wilkes retired from weightlifting. ’The expense was too great for the benefit,’ he explained. He had remained an amateur throughout, never turning professional; to train for the Olympics he took a month off with no pay. To have been given the time off with pay would have changed his status to that of a pro.
Although Dr Eric Williams should have been the one to honour him, being Chief Minister from 1956, then the first Prime Minister from 1962, Wilkes is adamant that he was a great man. ’I read Capitalism and Slavery,’ he declared, ’and I understood it.’ Williams’ 1940 thesis argued that without the slave trade there would not have been any Industrial Revolution in England, or capitalism, for that matter.
In any event, The Mighty Midget spent the next 30 years like any ordinary man, working as an electrician for the San Fernando Borough Council. In 1972 he was awarded the Hummingbird Medal (Gold), along with cricketer Sonny Ramadhin and cricket administrator Ramlal Bajnath for their contribution to sport.
If Wilkes is bitter about how successive governments, sports ministers and Olympic officials have ignored his achievements, he doesn’t say. As with many other incidents in his eventful life, Wilkes refuses to speak publicly about it, preferring to let God deliver justice. He makes a point of mentioning former Sports Minister Manohar Ramsaran though, who offered him some financial assistance. And a former mayor of San Fernando had a bust made of him which now stands on Harris Promenade - ’right next to Gandhi’, Wilkes points out with a smile. ’I am now a living immortal.’ Fellow Olympic medallist George Bovell III also paid homage, visiting him at home and giving him $10,000 out of his sports trust fund. Bovell, like the Beijing track team, received Chaconia Gold medals for their contributions to sport.
At 83, he is still as alert and bright-eyed as ever. He remembers every detail of his meteoric career; he is still fairly trim and has only minor ailments. He uses bush tea for any aches and pains, and is always on spot to hear the winning Play Whe numbers.
But the tragedy of being born to achieve greatness in a society that continues to deny itself its heroes shows on Rodney Wilkes’ face. Our first Olympic medallist remains neglected and un-honoured, left to live out his last days in anonymity.
- If you would like Rodney Wilkes to be honoured for his achievements by the Government, email adrenalin@
trinidadexpress.com
