This photograph is 106 winters old. It was captured at the Carlton ground before the third round match against Essendon on the afternoon of Saturday, May 16, 1908.

We know this because of the following listing in the club’s minutes five day’s previous;

“From F. Kneebone, artist, ‘Weekly Times’, wishing to take photo of team in match against Essendon on 16^th inst. – Resolved, reply be sent stating no objection so long as team is taken in the playing arena.”

Pictured are some of Carlton’s greatest players of a bygone era, including the captain Fred “Pompey” Elliott after whom the wartime Major General Harold Elliott was nicknamed; Charlie Hammond, the club’s only five-time Premiership player; and Norman “Hackenschmidt” Clark, who represented Carlton as a player in the Premiership hat trick of 1906-08 and later coached Carlton to its 1914 and ’15 Grand Final triumphs.

Also in the frame is Wally Koochew, who was just moments from making his Carlton debut and, in doing so, becoming League football’s first known senior player of Chinese origin.

A little more than a month previous, the following minute was recorded by the club;

“From Walter Koochew, Macedon, accepting with pleasure the invitation extended to him of having a game with Carlton, and stating that he will come down any time providing he gets a few days’ notice. – Resolved, left in hands of secretary.”

Koochew’s tenure at Carlton was all too brief, as he would represent the old dark Navy Blues just one more time – against the freshmen of University in Round 9 (Saturday, June 20, 1908). 

But his parting of the ways with the club had nothing to do with any issue of race, as has often been wrongly reported.

As has just been written, Koochew was originally invited by the club to train. Further, the club acted on a protesting member before Koochew’s departure, as the following minute of June 1 reveals;

“From C.W. Richardson, 640 Drummond St., Carlton, presenting his membership ticket to the club and requesting that his name be struck off the membership list; for the reason that the Society of Druids, to which he belonged, believed that the Carlton Club, by including a Chinaman in the team, was dealing a death blow to the White Australia policy. On the motion of Mr. Oxlade, sec. by Mr. Gurr, it was carried that the request contained in the letter that the writer’s name be struck off the membership list be complied with; Mr. Richardson to be notified to that effect.”

For the record, Carlton defeated Essendon in Round 3, 1908 – 5.13 (43) to 4.8 (32) – to assume its rightful place on top of the League ladder.