THE RL1908 BLOG

Michael Croke, whose intrepid past includes editing the Peter Jackson RL book and writing a book of league trivia questions amongst other deeds, reflects upon a now seemingly long-passed era of rugby league....

"Things were simple in the country in the 1960's and before. The town landscape was not cluttered in any way. No rushing traffic, no beeping mobiles. Tension was related strictly to wire and fence posts. Corner shops were still the  central neighbourhood point of the commercial and social world.

One could always grab a pound of SAOs at the side door when the store was officially closed. Train travel was still at its peak. Motor cars were coming into vogue. Mainly Holdens and Falcons. Nothing bought from any countries we had been at war with. The local paper was truly local. Every syllable was a window to the town's social happenings, sporting results, council matters, commercial world and the paper even contained the television guide relating to the hours when there was no test pattern.

The television shows seemed to stay the same for the whole year. I Love Lucy, McHales Navy, Bewitched. All preceding the national anthem at close of transmission. As the world changed and Armstrong was practising his moonwalk, television aerials were popping up on rooftops like fresh beans pushing their way through the spring soil.

But there was one other common denominator  that bound the town at many levels. The following of rugby league.The local competition and the Sydney competition.  It was the main topic of conversation for boys in the school yard, families at dinner tables and important people at civic meetings. Discuss the game. Assess the selections. Memorise the results.

Irish Catholic priests entwined the ability of Gasnier and the durability of Raper into  their homilies. Must have been the Gaelic rules connection. Indeed some cut their life lessons  short on a Sunday morning if it meant a speedier getaway to a nearby town to watch the local Catholic team against a foe whose supporters found great
enjoyment (during the game and during the course of a referee's decision) in reminding such travellers of their Lenten obligations with regard to the eating of meat!

Citizens followed their local side and citizens followed those teams in the Sydney competition. Many country folk had literally never been to the big smoke. Most certainly had never been to Cumberland Oval or Henson Park or even the Sydney Cricket Ground. The games were played on a Saturday. Shops in the country were open on a Saturday until lunchtime. Dubbo was a country town. It was my country town.

My memories of growing up there and following rugby league were strong. My
St.George poster was cut out from the Women's Weekly. My brother had his South Sydney one, also courtesy of the Women's Weekly.The first grade sides rarely changed. The posters remained current for a long time.For Souths it seemed to always be  Simms, James,Cleary, Branighan etc.My brother had glued his on white cardboard and fastened it to his bedroom wall. The prized possession in my bedroom was my Dally Messenger leather football. I polished it religiously and made sure
that, like a prized pup, it was safe in my bedroom every night away from the frost and other external forces.

On the supporting front, I would be pushed into the depths of depression if the ABC's John O'Reilly called a St.George loss. For the record O'Reilly's only sidekick at all games was the technician. No teams behind the microphone. He called the game, nothing more nothing less.

Such feelings  would stay with me for the week until he had informed me the next week that they had won and that Frank O'Rourke had awarded all his best and fairest points to St.George players and that one point would go to a boy from Canowindra, Peter Fitzgerald, who had moved to Sydney to play with the mighty Saints. I was starstruck when completing my final years of schooling in Sydney to find that Mr.
O'Rourke would be my history teacher. It was not hard to move his mind from the Treaty of Versailles to the importance of Jack Gibson's coaching.

But the Sydney rugby league scene was a world away when you grew up in the bush. We knew every minute detail about it but it was almost a fictional entity. ABC radio would broadcast the games on Saturday afternoons from the SCG  interrupted by races from Randwick and Doomben and Flemington and Geoff Mahoney's boxing roundup.

The Saturday ritual was to welcome home the family breadwinner who always had the Sydney Morning Herald in tow with the last minute game preview. We read it on
the back verandah where the July sun would taint the paper like a magnifying glass. This same paper would bring us the teams through the week and show us pictures of the Sydney sides training (always at night) in their T-shirts and jerseys of their former clubs. Saturday lunch would follow. The radio would be warmed up. Most homes only had one.

Keith Barnes' Friday night preview was not to be missed and was heard through the weekly ritual  of eating fish and chips. The same radio would bring us the nightime interstate games, from Lang Park, normally heard through the intermittent and fading haze of a Brisbane station like a wartime music show. The names were as distant as the broadcast. We wondered whether Lobegeiger was a strange machine for finding metal on a Gold Coast beach or a Queensland fullback.

The Monday papers had coverage of the games. No Broncos, No Knights, No Raiders. We all knew something about the Balmain area because we had all seen “My name's McGooley”on our black and white screens on Friday night. We knew the show was filmed somewhere near Leichhardt Oval. We were hoping Arthur Beetson would make a cameo appearance.

The 1969 grand final was telecast in living black and white into all the country lounge rooms. It was the first live telecast I remember. After that the local commercial station would telecast the second half of the previous week's minor game on a Friday night. Six  days after the game. North Sydney and Newtown always seemed to feature. But it was still a chance to see our heroes parade the screen. The ABC then extended its once a year coverage to Saturday night highlights. The Sydney Cricket ground seemed to always be the main venue. And then we had "Channel Rex" on
Sunday nights. But that was much later.

For most of us growing up in the bush, we had never seen a Sydney grade player let alone a Sydney first grader. They remained characters brought to life by John O'Reilly and later by people like Brian Surtees and Ray Warren as the Macquarie network decided that a brief and intermittent match coverage was better than none, as they were truly a racing station and the callers were Howard and Cary.

Rugby league broadcasts on commercial radio were normally confined to Reg Ferguson from Radio 2DU bringing us the Sunday afternoon match from Number 1
oval in Dubbo. But of course we were always at the game. The whole town went to the Sunday game. If you wanted to park your car at the game and view the game from the front seat the trick was to take it down on Saturday night. On Sunday you would watch the Under 18's, duck home for lunch and be back in time for the second half of the reserve grade.

Those lads who were not particularly interested in the game would spend their time collecting bottles. The redeemable five cent deposit was not to be scoffed at and could buy you a packet of chips from the ground canteen. The Dubbo Liberal would have extensive coverage of every game in the Monday afternoon edition. If your team was playing away in a town that had no game radio coverage, there would be a radio result service following the 6 o'clock local news that night. The results would bring agony and ecstasy. The results would be followed by the Holden dealers Top Ten songs for the week.

The commercial station had further merit, being Sydney based it was always the only one that would give us the City Firsts and Country First teams within minutes of them being selected. We sat by the radio with baited breath and pencil and paper in hand as the family dissected the team selection.It also came good with the NSW teams whilst the ABC was involving itself with more important issues.

The magic moments of these times still remain as clear as the bush sunset. The day that the postman delivered The Sun supporters kit. Why did my mother not call the school to tell me the kit had arrived? I would not have dawdled home.

It contained a photo, a badge, a pin, a flag and other goodies related to the team. It was a moment that could only be beaten by Christmas morning. I now had something in common with the youth of Sydney as they supported their team. We would sing from the one hymn book.

To supplement the kit we had the Scanlens footy cards. The odour of opening the pack to trawl through the 6 cards still remains. Everyone wanted to be  first one in the school yard to get the entire set of 100 plus. Why were Gary Leo and John Wittenberg always the difficult ones? And if very few people have kept their sets where have they all gone?

The world got closer when our near neighbours the Musgrave boys purchased their Sydney football jumpers from Mick Simmons sports store. Strictly mail order. Peter had a Balmain one and Neil a Western Suburbs one.The only lads in the whole school who had genuine Sydney football jumpers. I was inspired. I must save my money and do my jobs and then I would be the proud owner of a St.George jumper. The task would be completed and the jumper arrived. Oh no, the crest was a large
plastic one, as opposed to the small material one used by the players. I was literally crestfallen. I got used to it. My mother sewed a number on the back. I wore the jumper with pride every day after school and would play in the backyard and try to emulate my heroes.

It was around this time I remember seeing my first Rugby League Week newspaper.It was in 1970 and I was perched in the stand at Number one oval in Dubbo. I was curious to know  about the paper that was being read by the man in front of me. It seemed to contain only news and photos about rugby league. I was hooked from 5 yards. I'm sure I did not miss a single copy for the next twenty years and was always the first person on Wednesday morning to greet Joe Snare at the South Dubbo newsagency as he opened the bundle of 50 or more copies. By the end of the week I knew every morsel of the magazine from cover to cover.

There were other starlit moments. When Dubbo CYMS player Tom Jordan signed with St.George. The next Johnny Raper. Not quite. Let the record show that he played one first grade game for the Dragons in 1970 and scored no points! When Kel Brown from that same club made the NSW side and played Queensland on a weekday afternoon at the SCG. I heard of his inclusion on the 9 o'clock news on the Sunday night.

My memories of my first visit to Sydney as a 12 year old, aching to hear pop music and Frank Hyde on 2SM only to find that for the days of Easter it would be 24 hour religious programs from the Vatican!

Life goes on. The priests have passed away or gone home to Ireland. There is no real need to put the car into the ground on Saturday nights in the country anymore. I've lost my St.George jumper. Rugby League Week is in full colour and I haven't bought a copy in years. John O'Reilly has gone to the great broadcasting box in the sky. The Country sides don't really play City any more. All games are on television and
most are at night time.

The memories are vivid, the feelings are warm.

Now where is that Supporters kit? Perhaps with my treasured Tony Branson card."

Michael Croke   August 2007