Arnold Frank Hills (12 March 1857 – 7 March 1927) was an English businessman, sportsman, philanthropist, and activist. He played once for the England national football team in 1879. Hills was an advocate of temperance and vegetarianism, and served as president of the London Vegetarian Society and Vegetarian Federal Union.
Biography
Early life
Hills was born in Denmark Hill, Surrey, the son of a manufacturing chemist.
Sports career
Hills was a British mile champion, winning the 1878 AAC Championships title, and was the three-mile champion in 1879.
In his youth, he played football and cricket for Harrow School, where he captained the first XI. After leaving Harrow, he attended University College, Oxford, where he earned a B.A. in 1880 He founded the Oriolet Fruitarian Hospital at Loughton, under the medical direction of Josiah Oldfield.
Hills authored Vital Food (1892), which argued for a plant-based raw food diet.
Later life and death
The failing fortunes of the ironworks and Hills's involvement in developing a new car engine pushed the club into the background, and he became disabled due to arthritis. He died at Hammerfield, Penshurst, Kent, in 1927, aged 69, and was buried at St Luke's Church in Penshurst.
Legacy
Charles W. Forward's 1898 history of vegetarianism, Fifty Years of Food Reform, was dedicated to Hills.
In 2014, as part of its preparations for moving to the Olympic Stadium, West Ham announced that one of its corporate entertainment areas would be a private dining club named the Arnold Hills suite.
Publications
- Vital Food (1892)
- Vegetarian Essays (1897)
- Essays on Vegetarianism (1910)
References
Further reading
External links
- Arnold Hills — information from the International Vegetarian Union
- Arnold Hills — biography on the Oxford University Association Football Club website
- Arnold Hills — biography at Spartacus Educational
- Port of London History — information about the Thames Ironworks company