War stories
North Fremantle’s Peter Grosser and Baden Pratt speak to Cameron Palmer
While the Perth Football League celebrates 100 years in 2021, one club, North Fremantle, beat the League to the century by a year.
While North Fremantle was officially formed in 1921 there were loose ties to the North Fremantle side that competed in the WAFL from 1901 up to the World War I in 1915. Between 1921 and 1938, North Fremantle competed in the Fremantle Suburban Football Association.
It was not until 1939 that North Fremantle would compete in the League, then known as the WA Amateur Football Association, for the first time.
Once included, success came immediately for North Fremantle, winning the B Grade premiership in 1939 and the A Grade premiership two years later in 1941. The League was suspended during World War II, but when it resumed in 1946, North Fremantle continued where they left off, winning the A Grade flags of 1946 and 1947.
Past President and Life Member Baden Pratt reminisces about how through North Fremantle’s early years success on the footy field and loss on the battlefield had intertwined.
“We were admitted to the amateur league in the B Grade, went through undefeated, promoted to the A Grade and I think we won the next three premierships including one undefeated before World War II,” Pratt said.
“We lost 12 footballers in the conflict in Galipoli and the Western Front, and one airman fighting for the Royal Air Force.”
For a club that has history dating back through most of the major wars that have been fought by Australia, it is unsurprising that North Fremantle has been directly impacted by the loss of war. What the club has done to acknowledge these losses and the wider ANZAC spirit though, shows what can be achieved by a community club which has an aim to make a difference within their community.
Commencing in 2006, the club has held an ANZAC ceremony remembering the fallen, including those North Fremantle players that were lost in battle. As fellow North Fremantle Life Member Peter Grosser tells, from humble origins, it has grown to something far beyond a football club.
“Personally I think it’s actually grown beyond what I initially thought it could be, but it’s only because the club and the community have got together,” Grosser said.
“I think it’s fantastic for the club and the community because the community goes to it as well, so instead of going to the memorial at the park, they actually come to North Fremantle, and that’s the home of football.”
Given a vast number of Australians who lost their lives in war were of Colts age, North Fremantle has put a particular focus in ensuring that its own Colts players have understood this part of the history of the club and indeed part of Australian history. It is the North Fremantle Colts players who have taken ownership of this important day for the North Fremantle Football Club.
“The memorial down here at North Fremantle, all the colts carry all the jumpers of players that went away, the primary school gets involved, they do a service, we have the mayor of Fremantle come,” Grosser said.
“For the colts It’s an indoctrination into the history and so it binds the colts to club.”
As you would expect with a club that is now over 100 years old, there is a lot of history. How North Fremantle have chosen to preserve that history has sent an ongoing high standard benchmark for all Perth Football League clubs. It is a credit to great people who have upheld a proud community spirit for over a century.
