Way out West
Journeys back to where ‘once was boyhood’ are both nostalgic and uplifting.
Last week I travelled west to revisit sports fields of long ago and people I’ve always greatly admired.
A tiny village north of Co ac is Warrion, featured recently in the Herald Sun. Officially, its population is 22 and there’s a pub, a church, and a community hall.
It also has an idyllic cricket field lovingly tended by a retired farmer. The summer game still thrives on this glorious stretch of turf.
West of Colac, and ensconced with his family in a converted church, is Michael Murray.
A bit of a character at Assumption College, he was a brilliant footballer who was a champion player with Neale Daniher’s 1978 team.
Bradman Oval, fashioned on the edge of the drained lake, was a Mecca each Wednesday arvo year-round for house battle royals at cricket or footy—and the picturesque racecourse where annually we had our house athletics on the straight.
On the way to Mortlake, I deviated via places such as Noorat, Glenormiston, Kolora, and The Sisters. Wonderful little close-knit communities where people really cared for and supported one another.
Depleted they are now, but certainly not broken.
Ronnie Holmes at Kolora is a bush legend.
He is a farmer with lifetime football, cricket, tennis, and community involvement—just a fantastic person.
In a similar vein are the Kennas of rural Glenormiston—brothers widely respected, and also distant former students of ACK.
At The Sisters, the names of Coolahan and Harris reverberate still. Fierce competitors and truly archetypal ‘muddied oafs’ and ‘flannelled fools’, they were as tough and resilient as the rolling farm fields that nurtured them.
Onwards to Mortlake—a little-changed market town of a thousand people at the gentle foothills of Mt Shadwell.
Like spokes of a wheel, some of the renowned squatter properties of the Western District’s scion families branch out from Mortlake’s hub. The names Weatherley, Manifold, Urquhart, Palmer, Hood, and Calvert are writ large in the region’s history.
My dad was a shearer (and tent boxer), and he spoke well of these people, most of whom he seasonally worked for.
His favourite was the celebrated pianist Hepzibah Menuhin, the wife of Aspro ‘King’ Lindsay Nicholas. Their sheep station was near Darlington.
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Finally, on to tiny Hexham by the Hopkins River—or what remains of a once vibrant village.
The school has gone, so too the wonderful general store. Cricket, tennis, and football clubs are no more while the old racecourse is forlorn and idle.
My grandfather’s blacksmith shop has long gone. He was a farrier to many of the illustrious polo families of the district.
lt is sad indeed when a school goes—generations of youth with their hopes and fears, their tears and laughter, all but erased from memory.
But this is just part of reality and ‘progress’ across country Australia. The ‘village schoolmaster’ is but a distant memory.
Award winner
Herald Sun journalist Michael Warner has just won the prestigious Walkley Award for explosive stories this year, after exposing the AFL drugs rort.
It’s not the first time the investigative journalist has been recognised for his work within the competitive industry. In 2022, he won the Walkley Award for sports reporting, the Melbourne Press Club Gold Quill, and was named the Harry Gordon Australian Sports Journalist of the Year.
Warner is also the author of the best-selling book The Boys’ Club—the inside story behind the power and politics of the AFL. The AFL hierarchy tired to ban it from publication but were unsuccessful. Michael is a grandson of the legendary Denis Warner, a brilliant war correspondent.
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A Peninsula Grammar ex-student, Warner played cricket and football against ACK. I recall talking to him one day during a First XI lunch break about his renowned grandfather. Michael’s dad Nick Warner is a distinguished Australian spy chief.
UK memory
An early Christmas card arrived yesterday from the young lady pictured. From a fine family in the glorious West Sussex countryside, where I stayed at a B&B a few years ago, Sally took me to Arundell Castle, home of the Duke and Duchess of Norfolk, during my stay.
