{{Short description|British athlete}} {{Use dmy dates|date=April 2025}} {{Use British English|date=April 2025}} {{Infobox sportsperson | name = James Cormack | image = | caption = | nationality = British (Scottish) | sport = Athletics | event = long-distance/marathon | club = London Athletic Club<br>Edinburgh Harriers<br>Pretoria Harriers<br>Transvaal Athletic Association | birth_date = 28 January 1877 | birth_place = Ayr, Scotland | death_date = 22 January 1965 (aged 87) | death_place = Kingswood, Surrey, England | height = | weight = }}
'''James Noble Cormack''' {{post-nominals|country=GBR|RIBA}} (28 January 1877 – 22 January 1965) was a Scottish architect and track and field athlete who competed at the 1906 Olympic Games.<ref name=oly>{{cite web|url=https://www.olympedia.org/athletes/79612 |title=James Cormack |work=Olympedia |access-date=10 April 2025}}</ref>
==Biography== James Cormack was born in Ayr, a small town near Edinburgh, Scotland. No definitive information is available about his family. He was educated at Ayr Academy and the Edinburgh Institution for Languages and Mathematics.<ref>{{cite news |url=https://www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk/viewer/bl/0001876/19010419/075/0004 |title=Eastern Athletic Notes |work=Scottish Referee |date=19 April 1901 |via=British Newspaper Archive|url-access=subscription |access-date=10 April 2025}}</ref> In 1902, he took the position of draughtsman at the Public Works Department of Cradock, South Africa. Later that year, he transferred to the Public Works Department of the Transvaal in Pretoria and, in 1910, became Inspector of Works. He was a member of the South African Institute of Architects and received his RIBA membership in 1911. In 1912, he became the Transvaal Public Works Department’s Assistant Engineer.<ref name=EIA>{{cite web|url=https://www.europeansineastafrica.co.uk/_site/custom/database/default.asp?a=viewIndividual&pid=2&person=11640 |title=View entry James Cormack |website=Europeans In East Africa |access-date=10 April 2025}}</ref>
With the outbreak of World War I, Cormack enlisted in the Cape Town Highlanders and was commissioned with the rank of Major. It is not known if he fought in the regiment’s African campaign, or its battles in France, but he may have been injured, as the Public Works Department listed him as being ‘On Leave’ in 1919.<ref name="facts">{{cite web |title=CORMACK, James Noble |url=https://www.artefacts.co.za/main/Buildings/archframes.php?archid=304 |website=artefacts.co.za |publisher=Artefacts |access-date=9 April 2026}}</ref> In 1924, he went to work for the Imperial War Graves Commission, which named him Deputy Director of Works in East Africa,<ref>{{cite web |title=REPORT OF THE SPECIAL COMMITTEE TO REVIEW HISTORICAL INEQUALITIES IN COMMEMORATION, p 47 |url=https://www.cwgc.org/media/noantj4i/report-of-the-special-committee-to-review-historical-inequalities-in-commemoration.pdf |website=cwgc.org |publisher=COMMONWEALTH WAR GRAVES COMMISSION |access-date=8 April 2026}}</ref> and then he became the commission’s Director of Works in South West Africa.<ref name="facts"/>
Cormack retired in 1931<ref name=EIA/> and with his wife Mary, whom he had married in 1924, moved to Tanganyika, where they bought a 400-acre farm which Cormack named 'Ailsa', after the Scottish island Ailsa Craig. The property had been a German pig farm which was surrendered to the British after the Armistice; the Cormacks turned it into a self-sustaining hotel and their sons, Keith and David, became professional hunting guides.<ref>{{cite web |title=The Challenge of Africa |url=https://www.chimalamission.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/Vol-1-No-9-10-Sept-Oct-Newsletter-2019-1.pdf |website=chimalamission.com |publisher=DALRAIDA CHURCH OF CHRIST CHIMALA MISSION |access-date=8 April 2026}}</ref> In 1962, the Cormacks sold Aisla to missionaries and moved to England, where Cormack died in 1965.<ref name=oly/><ref>{{cite web |title=1969 Tanzania Safari, #64 |url=https://www.africahunting.com/threads/1969-tanzania-safari.15853/page-4 |website=africahunting.com |publisher=Africa Hunting |access-date=8 April 2026}}</ref>
=== Athletic Career === Cormack was a distance runner<ref name=oly/> and a member of the Edinburgh Harriers and the London Athletic Club. In the Amateur Athletic Association of England’s AAA Championships in Scotland in 1901, he ran the 880-yard race and placed fourth. In 1902, he won the 440-yard race. Also in 1902, in the AAA Scotland vs Ireland event in Dublin, he finished second in the 880-yard race.<ref>{{cite web |title=Track Championships 1900 – 1909 |url=http://www.anentscottishrunning.com/track-championships-1900-1909/ |website=anentscottishrunning.com |publisher=Anent Scottish Running |access-date=8 April 2026}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |url=https://www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk/viewer/bl/0000452/19010622/062/0003 |title=The Scottish Athletic Championships |work=Edinburgh Evening News |date=22 June 1901 |via=British Newspaper Archive|url-access=subscription |access-date=10 April 2025}}</ref>
In South Africa, he was a member of the Transvaal Athletic Association and captain of the Pretoria Harriers; he won the club’s cross-country championship in 1904.<ref name=oly/> That year, he won the 25-mile South African cross-country championship and, in 1906, ran for Britain at the Olympics in Athens, where he placed 14th (3-35:00) and became the first British subject to finish an Olympic marathon.<ref>{{cite web |title=Marathon, Men |url=https://www.olympedia.org/results/56213 |website=olympedia.org |publisher=Olympedia |access-date=8 April 2026}}</ref>
== References == {{Reflist}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Cormack, James}} Category:1877 births Category:1965 deaths Category:People educated at Ayr Academy Category:People educated at Stewart's Melville College Category:Sportspeople from Ayr Category:Olympic athletes for Great Britain Category:Athletes (track and field) at the 1906 Intercalated Games Category:Scottish men marathon runners Category:British men marathon runners Category:Scottish men long-distance runners Category:British men long-distance runners Category:19th-century Scottish sportsmen Category:20th-century Scottish sportsmen Category:Black Watch soldiers Category:British Army personnel of World War I Category:Military personnel from South Ayrshire Category:British expatriate sportspeople in South Africa