John Snow (cricketer) - Early Life

Early Life

Snow was born in Peopleton, Worcestershire, the son of a Scottish vicar who soon after took up a living in the Diocese of Worcester at the village of Elmley Castle. When he was born his grandfather, a cricket coach, rang his father in Scotland to announce that "It's a young cricketer!" and he was given a cricket bat to chew when he was a baby. He learned how to play in the three-acre grounds of the vicarage with his father, mother, grandfather and three sisters and later in village matches. Snow's rural childhood was completely unaffected by the war or rationing and he used to chop down trees for firewood, excellent exercise for the muscles needed for fast bowling (Frank Tyson was once a tree-feller). First educated at Christ's Hospital, he moved to Chichester High School for Boys the year before his father became vicar at nearby Bognor Regis, where he was trained by the Warwickshire batsman Len Bates. Living in Sussex he joined the Bognor Colts, as had Peter May and David Sheppard before him, and had the great honour of being bowled by Frank Worrell when they played Antilles. He also began playing games for the Sussex Young Amateurs and Junior Marletts. As a teenager he had been a better batsman than a bowler, but as more boys wanted to bat than bowl he concentrated on the latter. After school he attended Culham Teachers Training College near Abingdon, but his studies suffered as he played more First Class Cricket. He played rugby throughout his teens, but gave up the game in 1961 as it interfered with his cricket career.