Cricket's Historians

300 Appendix One Peter Wynne-Thomas of earlier players. The main division of labour was that Bailey provided the career figures, Thorn a mountain of biographical data and Wynne-Thomas the important contribution of writing brief but readable entries for the huge number of players covered as well as typing the manuscript. An updated edition came out in 1993. In 1988 the Trent Bridge ground had been in existence for 150 years so to mark this occasion came Trent Bridge. A history of the ground to commemorate the 150th anniversary 1838-1988 in which Wynne-Thomas indulged in a full-scale history of the county rather than restricting himself solely to the story of the ground. A 32- page supplement appeared in 1994. That was not Wynne-Thomas’ only tilt at a Nottinghamshire history at this time. In the early 1990s the publisher Helm brought out a series of county histories to which he contributed volumes on Hampshire and Lancashire as well as Nottinghamshire. At this period Wynne-Thomas was also editing the Nottinghamshire Yearbook (formerly the annual) as well as writing articles for a variety of cricket publications but his major attention was focused on a wider field than just Nottinghamshire. The History of Cricket. From the Weald to the World (HM Stationery Office, 1997) not only covered all available research into the game’s past as well as including some impressive theories of the author’s, but convincingly demolished some of the myths and wackier ideas about cricket’s origins. Perhaps the most pioneering work of all was Nottinghamshire Cricket Grounds (Nottinghamshire County Council, 2001) whose title implies coverage of the grounds used by the county club but whose scope is explained in the sub-title “being a tour and survey of 463 past or present grounds in the County with a Ploughman’s Lunch or two”, this last phrase referring to the many village pubs called at for refreshment over the course of three years of research. Wynne- Thomas’ industry is apparent not just in the pursuit of many lost grounds but also in the diagrams he provides for a large number of those still existing. At its publication this was a unique achievement which has since inspired a few other researchers to start on a similar quest in their own counties. One major achievement, however, still lacks a publisher. This is Wynne- Thomas’ monumental Index to The Cricketer 1921-2004 which he compiled over some twenty years in time off from his other cricket labours. It exists in the Trent Bridge library on hundreds of index cards but needs to be transferred into typescript. Many researchers have made valuable use of it so its preservation in more permanent form is an urgent necessity. Meanwhile, for Peter Wynne- Thomas, work continues on the latest Nottinghamshire annual.