began to fail from around 1939 to the point where he was completely blind by 1952. He was given honorary membership of the Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC) in 1949 and remained a respected figure within the game until his death in 1973. Early life and career Beginnings Rhodes was born in the village of Kirkheaton, just outside Huddersfield, in 1877. His family moved to a farm two miles away while he was very young. He went to school in nearby Hopton, and later to Spring Grove School in Huddersfield. His father, Alfred Rhodes, was captain of the Kirkheaton cricket team's Second XI and encouraged his son to play cricket, buying him equipment and having a pitch laid near their home for Wilfred to practice. By the time Rhodes left school, aged 16, he had joined Kirkheaton Cricket Club and started to take cricket seriously: he watched Yorkshire when they played close to his home and began to consider a career as a professional cricketer. Around 1893 he took a job working on the railway in the local town of Mirfield. By now playing regularly for Kirkheaton Second XI, Rhodes's keenness to reach one game on time led him to ring the off-duty bell before the end of the shift and as a result he lost his job. Subsequently, he worked on a local farm, which allowed him more time for cricket. By 1895 he achieved a place in the Kirkheaton first team, and was recommended to Gala Cricket Club, of Galashiels, Scotland, as a professional. Professional club cricketer Rhodes played for Gala Cricket Club in 1896 and 1897, as an all-rounder who opened the batting and bowled medium paced seamers. He took 92 wickets in his first season, and discovered that bowling an occasional slow ball brought him some success. He decided to change his bowling style to spin, and spent the winter of 1896–97 practising on the family farm while also working again on the railway, this time as a signalman. Over several months, Rhodes used his practice sessions to develop control of spin and different types of delivery. Consequently, in his second season at Galashiels, now bowling slow left-arm, he took fewer wickets but at a better average. At the end of the 1897 season, encouraged by a Scottish member of the MCC, he resigned from Gala to look for work in England. First-class cricketer Beginning as a