An 1897 club membership card, an ’87 Grand Final admission ticket, and a lifesize color poster of “Big Nick” – these were just some of the treasured items of memorabilia on show at the recent Carlton Collectibles Day at Visy Park.
An audience of committed Carlton people, including the descendants of players of yesteryear like Charlie Fisher and Edward Augustus “Ansell” Clarke, came back to Carlton armed with their precious keepsakes.
Clarke, the 145-game player from 1929-’37 and captain in his final year, was represented in the room by his octogenarian son Allan and teenage great grandson Ben Tebbutt. Together they came with a treasured memento, the annual report of 1936, which carries an image of Clarke as the 1936 Robert Reynolds Memorial Trophy winner for Carlton Best and Fairest.
Allan Clarke with his grandson Ben at the Carlton Collectibles Day. (Photo: Carlton Football Club)
Sadly, the family has no knowledge of any trophy or medallion that may have been handed to Clarke, who earned the nickname of the Panamanian-born American featherweight boxer of the 1920s, Ansell Bell. All they have is the report, which carries a very special message penned by Clarke to Allan’s daughter (and Ben’s mother) not long before he died at the age of 95 in 2002.
The inscription reads as follows:
“To my favourite Grand Daughter Jacqueline,
I thought you would like this photo of myself, just in case I may not see you again. I can’t last forever you know, but I sincerely hope that I do see you and your husband sometime in the near future.
Till then I wish you long life and happiness, good health and lots of love from your grandfather Ansell xxxx”
“I remember Dad mainly as a person who worked for Carlton,” Allan, now 83, recalled. “He did a lot of recruiting for Carlton after he retired and he recruited a lot of good players – players like Geoff Southby, Trevor Keogh, Jimmy Buckley and (Peter) McConville,” Clarke said.
“The funny thing is that he was a Fitzroy supporter, but he lived on the Carlton side of Nicholson Street where his father ran a bootmaker’s shop and that’s why he couldn’t play for Fitzroy.
“I’ve been a Carlton supporter since the day I was born. I’ve got a Carlton membership ticket of 1940 which Dad must have bought for me and only cost about ten bob, and I saw the 1945 ‘Bloodbath’.”
Ben too is a regular at most Carlton games.
“I’ve stuck with them all these years because my grandfather brought me up here from the time I was eight. I was there when the club was at its lowest ebb and I was there when they shut Princes Park down.”
The Carlton Collectibles Day also doubled as a rare “meet and greet” with John Nicholls - the legendary five-time Carlton Best and Fairest and three-time Premiership player recently voted this club’s greatest footballer in 150 years – who made a guest appearance.
“Big Nick” graciously agreed to grace the place with his substantial presence, address the gathering, pose for photographs and sign autographs.
Jamie Sanderson, who developed the renowned club website The Blueseum, was also in attendance, as was Australian football card researcher and Carlton devotee Damien Green.
