Goalkeeper R.G. Brebner became the first – and possibly only – Darlington-born person to win an Olympic gold medal. He attended Darlington Grammar School and later became a dentist, filling cavities in his practice in Coniscliffe Road, but he also filled in between the sticks for Darlington FC as an amateur goalkeeper. In 1910, he was man of the match as the Quakers humbled First Division Sheffield United – ‘rarely before could such a masterly exhibition of goalkeeping have been seen at Bramall Lane’, declared the Echo – during their great FA Cup. The following season, he turned out for Queen’s Park Rangers and Huddersfield Town.
He played in all three of Great Britain’s matches at the 1912 Stockholm Olympics, including the 4–2 win over Denmark in the final.
However, about two months after winning his gold medal, he was injured – possibly when diving at the feet of an opponent – while playing for Leicester Fosse against Wolverhampton Wanderers, and never recovered. He died eighteen months later, aged 33. ‘He was undoubtedly one of the most capable amateur goalkeepers in the country, and he attained practically all the honours that come to an amateur, although his ambition to be selected in a representative game for all England was never realised,’ said his obituary in the Darlington and Stockton Times. He is buried in West Cemetery.
(‘Memories’, The Northern Echo, 2012)