A Medal for Robert Smith Across the Centuries

Many many years ago my father bought this old cycling medal because it had R Smith on it, which is me. Apparently he gave it to me, but I was 20 and didn't care. Luckily my mother is a hoarder and she put it away. A few months ago someone was asking about any old coins or medals we had and wanted to sell. Mum remembered this medal and said she would look for it. I have been looking at the Smith family off and on for years. A divorce between my grandparents in the early 1960s and my grandfather's disappearance meant that I knew hardly anything about them. Gradually I've been able to piece together a very interesting history which, like many of us, I want to turn into a book. My great grandfather Robert Strachan Smith died a decade before I was born. My father remembers little of him except that from the toilet of his house in Napier Street, Cottesloe you could see the train passing. In the last fortnight I have discovered a lot about his education days. He went to school at Fremantle School, then at 14 went to Alexander Scotch College (the forerunner of Scotch College). Afterwards he went to Glasgow, the birthplace of his father, to study Electrical Engineering at what is now the University of Strathclyde. In Trove I found mention of him at Scotch as a cyclist. From distant Jamaican cousins I had a copy of a faded photo showing him on a bike in a racing position. Today Mum found that medal. Its engraving is hard to make out but together we have deciphered it. Its sterling silver and maybe the name Cooper or Hooper is at the top. Then FS for Fremantle School. In Trove 18/12/1897 there is an article on the annual Fremantle School speech day. It also says that on the previous day there had been the Fremantle school annual sports day. In the boys 2 mile cycling race J Gallop (Fremantle School) came first and R Smith (Scotch College, Perth) second. The medal says 'Int Sch 2M' and below that '2'. So this is the medal my Great Grandfather won on a warm Friday in Fremantle 122 years ago as 14 year old boy. Roughly 90 years later my father brought it because it had my name on it. It wasn't worth anything as silver. Today I put all the evidence together.