Richard Norris grew up in India before being sent to King’s School Canterbury, where he represented Kent Schools at hockey, rugby and cricket as well as playing for the Kent men’s hockey team. He also played at the Junior Wimbledon tennis tournament. Moving to Trinity College, Oxford, where he took a degree in engineering, Norris continued to excel on the hockey field, winning a Blue every year he was at university. Centre-forward Norris was selected for the British 1952 Olympic team, where he played in three games and scored one goal to help win bronze. In all, he was capped five times with the British team and scored four goals. He was also capped 17 times with English team, scoring 18 goals.
After completing national service in the Royal Artillery, Norris joined the Nautical College at Pangbourne in 1957 as a math teacher and hockey coach. A year later Norris moved to South Africa and worked for the next 14 years with Hilton College, near Pietermaritzburg, as a housemaster, head of physics and hockey coach. Norris also continued to play hockey, winning the South African inter-provincial tournament from 1960-64 with the Natal team. Norris returned to England in 1971 and, after a stint at Millfield School in Somerset, was housemaster of Hesperus division at Pangbourne College form 1972-88 and a math teacher there from 1972-92. After retiring from Pangbourne, Norris taught privately and had a mathematics textbook published by Cambridge University Press. In 2008 he moved back to South Africa to be near his daughter and grandchildren.
Great Britain