Richard Kindersley

Richard Frampton Kindersley was educated at Eton and then Magdalene College, Cambridge. He rowed for his college at Cambridge but was not a rowing Blue, unlike his father Richard, who was both a rowing and rugby Blue, but at Oxford. He took part in five Oxford – Cambridge encounters and was on the winning VIII or XV each time, and he also played rugby for England three times between 1883-85. He was a master at Eton College, and Radley.

Although he never won a rowing Blue, Kindersley junior took part in the trials for the 1908 and 1909 races, but never got a seat in the final eight. He studied mechanical sciences at university and, after leaving Cambridge, became a civil engineer. During World War I, he was a Prisoner of War at Ruhleben, Germany. There were so many keen footballers in the camp at the same time that, in November 1914, they formed themselves into representatives of various English football clubs and ran their own equivalent of the “FA Cup”. Kindersley was a member of the Oldham Athletic side made up of ex-public schoolboys, but they lost 9-1 to Tottenham Hotspur in the final. During World War II Kindersley served as a lieutenant in the Bedfordshire Home Guard.

In 1934 Kindersley, along with the well-known big-game fisherman Teddie Peel, took out a patent on a fishing reel to make the landing of big fih easier.