Who is that peering through the doorway? 

Whilst getting up-close and personal with our Team of the Century (and the commemorative artwork in particular), how’s another wonderful tribute that goes largely overlooked within its focused locker room surrounds. It is a generous and gracious gesture of respect to that other integral, essential feature of every football club – the loyal fan. After all, what would any flickering flame be without a robust ‘fan’ to create the necessary draft for it to rise above a certain height so as to fully blaze and reach its maximum ferocity, or to simply cool things down when it all goes wrong?

As such, peering through the doorway (in the artwork) from the stands into the Smithy captivated change room of the oldest footy club in the world is one Marjorie Whitehead, who saw ‘in person’ every premiership win the club achieved (except for that of 1900) which amounted to 11 witnessed triumphs in all, for this absolutely one-eyed Dee-votee.

Thus, when you think what Marjorie experienced it is no wonder and rightfully so, that she was considered and celebrated as an outright living treasure of the club. And if you hadn’t already joined the dots, this remarkable woman would’ve actually cheered at some stage each and every player in that ‘once in a century’ side – all the way from Warne-Smith and Chadwick, Barassi and Beckwith through to Lyon and Stynes!

NSW Demons dyed-in-the-wool fans

We have some absolute troopers of our own in the ranks of the NSW Demons. I’d like to thank and give a ‘shout out’ to Jim Cattlin for getting in touch and recounting so many great memories of following Melbourne from the Grand Final of ‘48 through to the present day.

Nothing beats his yarn about how his dad would try to beat the steam train back to Melbourne in the car from Geelong when the boys played down there; or how he still pines for his long lost ‘55-56-57 winning Weg poster, not to mention the tears he shed one afternoon at the ‘G having to sit through a fired-up John Coleman rip through the defenses of our side back in the late 40’s.

The great Jack Mueller

by Michael Peters

I have to comment on the article by Nigel Dawe on the great Jack Mueller. It was so interesting. I was lucky enough to see the great Jack on two occasions—the two Grand Finals of 1948 (the first was drawn). I was quite young (10 years old) and so do not have a clear memory of either game, except I can clearly remember the chaos and screaming all around during the last few minutes of the first game, with the scores level and both sides straining desperately for the winning point. A draw. The footy gods were smiling in the replay, with Melbourne winning comfortably against the “unbeatable” Essendon.

Jack Mueller had spent the entire season coaching and playing in the Twos, as he had retired from senior footy. But Checker Hughes had brought him back into the Seniors for the Finals—a great decision as he combined again with Norm Smith in the forward line. I have a great photo mounted of Jack and Denis Cordner carrying the Captain Don Cordner from the ground—three jubilant men.

It was good to read those great words by Nigel Dawe about Jack, one of the very greatest of our legends

Actually I missed most of the Golden Years of the Club, because I was off in the Army throughout them, often overseas, and rarely anywhere near Melbourne.

I was at the 1954 runners up Grand Final, and I got to see the great 1957 big Grand Final win, but all the other premierships I was only able to listen to on the radio——that was still good of course.

The greatest shock was the loss in 1958—we were red-hot favourites but lost. You probably know the story. Their Captain Weideman and Harrison went about making a fight of it, and our stars were sucked in—tried to win the fight and the game as well. Lost them both. It would have given us four in a row to equal Collingwood’s record—and that would have stretched to six in a row in 1959-60. Because of 1958 I am delighted to see young Weideman in Melbourne’s uniform. In his first game the whole extended Weideman family, men and women, turned up in red and blue scarves, including father and grandfather both Collingwood players and one a captain. Young Weideman was best on ground in our great Final win over Geelong in 2018, and I’m always hoping to see him in the team

Good luck to you, Nigel. I enjoyed your article about the great Jack very much. Jack died of course only a few months ago.

MFC, Olympics and the NSW Demons

Sally Trevena

Our recent story of Melbourne VFL premiership footballer Corrie Gardner, who was one of only two athletic representatives at the St Louis Olympic Games in 1904, prompted his grandson William Streeton, to share more of Corrie’s story and his passion for the Demons.

William remembers him as a passionate Demons supporter to his death. William has very fond memories of him, despite being very young and remembers going with him to the MCG and watching Ron Barassi, John Lord etc playing. He died watching a televised match of Melbourne playing and winning against Collingwood.

Corrie’s brothers, Mark & Eric also played for Melbourne. Corrie and Eric played together from 1900, 1901, 1902 & 1903, Mark played in1904 and Corrie and Mark in 1905.

I was delighted to hear from William and never cease to be amazed by the ongoing connections between our footy club’s history and members of the NSW Demons audience.

Thank you William

Read the original story here

Go Dees.