CREUS , Julian [1917-1992]
Julian Creus was born in Liverpool on 30th June 1917. His father, Barcelona-born Julio José Pedro Creus, had been killed two months earlier on 21st April when the ship on which he was serving, S S Pontiac, was attacked by a U-Boat. The Commonwealth War Graves record shows that at the time the family were living at 59 Kent Street L8.
Standing just over 5 feet tall he spent his working life in the city as a docker but his pursuit of weightlifting brought him a host of medals and world records and three Olympic Games appearances. He took up the sport when aged 17 following an accident in which a fall from a roof left him with two broken legs. Some fourteen years later, at The London Olympics of 1948, he won a silver medal in the bantamweight division. That same year saw him crowned European bantamweight champion. 1950 saw him lifting in the slightly heavier featherweight class, winning silver medals at the Empire and European Games and a bronze ath World Championships. He was hampered at the 1952 Helsinki Olympics by a foot injury sustained on the docks and finished ninth. Retiring from the sport in 1954 he made a comeback in 1956 winning another British title at the aged of 39. This performance took him into the British team for the 1956 Melbourne Olympics at which he finished 11th. The trip to Australia changed his life as he so liked the country that four years later he and his family emigrated. He attended the 1970 Commonwealth Games at Edinburgh as an adviser to the Australian team but declined an invitation to compete. He died in Sydney, Australia on 9th September 1992 aged 75.
Creus and his family lived for some years at 62 Mozart Street L8 and from the mid-1950’s at 28 Bruton Road, Huyton. Neither house is still standing.
He seems to have been a feisty character if a report in the Liverpool Echo (11th September 1957) is anything to go by. He was fined £2 by the Prescot magistrates for driving a motorcycle combination with no mud wing fitted to the sidecar. The prosecuting police Inspector told the court that after a conversation with a police officer Creus “drove away making derogatory noises with his mouth”.
None of Creus' homes noted above are still standing.
SOURCES AND FURTHER READING
I have found no particular source for information in Julian Creus, the Wikipedia entry being somewhat minimal.