The Age's footy landmarks - Punt Rd Oval Grandstand

[one-eyed]

Landmarks
By Paul Daffey
The Age
May 28, 2005

HISTORY

During the 1913 football season, crowds at Punt Road grew so much that spectators were turned away, prompting Richmond Cricket Club secretary George Bird to formulate a debenture scheme that raised £4000 to build the stand. It was completed in 1914 by Elsternwick construction firm L. & J. Roswell to designs prepared by architecture firm T. Watts and Son. An extension was added in 1927.

DESIGN

In its simple form of expression, the Punt Road stand resembles the 1900 stand at Maryborough's Princes Park. According to a conservation analysis prepared for the City of Melbourne in 2001, the Punt Road stand's red-brick base is "surmounted by a low-pitched roof resting on a wall at the back of the stand and on slender columns at the front of the stand. The roof features four trussed gables and timber fretwork."

MEN OF HONOUR

The stand at Punt Road was originally named after Dave Chessell, a schoolmaster and historian, who served as Richmond Cricket Club secretary in three long stints, beginning in 1893, and as a football club committeeman. Chessell had a habit of quoting Shakespeare in his cricket club annual reports. The stand was renamed after Jack Dyer on May 24, 1998, during one of Dyer's last official functions.

MASTERPIECE

Richmond Cricket Club president E. J. Cotter, who was also a state politician, laid the stand's foundation stone with a silver trowel before the opening bounce of the match between Richmond and Fitzroy on May 2, 1914. Australian Prime Minister Andrew Fisher opened the stand before the match between Richmond and South Melbourne on June 6, 1914. According to Frank Tyson's History of the Richmond Cricket Club, the stand was considered a modern masterpiece. It could accommodate 1200 spectators and housed a bar, gymnasium, social rooms and six showers.

BLOODY TIGERS

While opening the stand, Prime Minister Fisher declared his distaste for violence in sport. He then looked on as players from both teams repeatedly landed punches and elbows during the match. At quarter-time, umpire Davies was forced to have stitches in a head wound after a spectator had thrown a stone at him. Later, Richmond defender Edward Farrell lay flat on the turf after a clash with South Melbourne's Arthur "Poddy" Hiskens, while Richmond centreman Sid Reeves received a nasty cut over his right eye. Tiger teammates ran riot in their attempts to square up. At three-quarter-time, committeemen R. T. Kelly, of Richmond, and L. M. Thomson, of South Melbourne, spoke to their players about bringing the game into disrepute. Fisher's comments after the match, which the Bloods won by three goals, were unrecorded.

TIGER RUG

Every Friday night in winter during the 1950s and '60s, Robyn Pegler would go to her grandmother Christine Dempster's house in Sussex Street, Thornbury, to make ham sandwiches to take to the Richmond game. Members of the Dempster family would then meet friends the next morning before the gates opened at 8am. Such an early start enabled them to get their spot in the front row of the Punt Road stand, where they hung a tiger rug over the railing. If you see photos from games at Punt Road in the early 1960s, the only adornments on the stand are a small Vic Bitter sign and the distinctive tiger rug.

Pegler, now 54, said the last game at Punt Road, against Hawthorn in round 18, 1964, was one of the saddest days of her grandmother's life. "She never really liked the MCG."

BURN 'EM ALIVE

During the mid-1970s, the stand was within minutes of being burned down when a fire started by a handful of homeless men got out of control. The fire burned half a dozen rows of seats about halfway up the stand before firemen arrived. The area remained in disrepair until refurbishments were completed in the mid-'90s. The names of those who contributed to the Jack Dyer Foundation, which was set up to fund ground improvements, are on nine plaques at the back of the stand.

FINAL WORD

"I have no time for the player who claims to be a sport and then endeavours to injure his opponent by sly methods."

- Prime Minister Andrew Fisher while opening the Punt Road stand, just before Richmond and South Melbourne players began engaging in sly methods.

http://www.realfooty.theage.com.au/realfooty/articles/2005/05/27/1117129893339.html

[one-eyed]

Grandstands offer a glimpse of Melbourne's soul
Paul Daffey
The Age
June 8, 2006

THE grandstand at the Punt Road Oval is not just a grand building, looming at the oval's edge and staring at drivers as they emerge from beneath the railway bridge that crosses Punt Road. The two men after whom the grandstand has been named offer an insight into the place of sport, especially football and cricket, in Melbourne.

After the completion of the stand in 1914, it was named after Dave Chessell, a schoolmaster and historian, who served on the Richmond football and cricket clubs' committees for four decades. Chessell had a habit of quoting Shakespeare in cricket club annual reports.

In May 1998, the stand was renamed after Jack Dyer, the legendary former Richmond ruckman who was a policeman before becoming a tongue-tied media identity. When he was a young man, Dyer's mother was worried about watching him play because she feared he would be hurt. But after watching him, she was worried that his opponents would be hurt.

Located on the fringe of a suburb that was once known as Struggletown, the Punt Road Oval has never been a place for the faint of heart.

After former prime minister Andrew Fisher had opened the stand before a football match between Richmond and South Melbourne in 1914, players from both teams indulged in such a flurry of fisticuffs that a committeeman from each club descended from the stand at three-quarter time to appeal to the players to go easy in front of the prime minister.

In this same era, Barney Herbert, another legendary Richmond ruckman, who was also a policeman, is said to have coined the Tigers' catchcry of "Eat 'em alive". After becoming Richmond president, Herbert would sing his catchcry from his place in the Punt Road crowd. Such tales have been etched into the subconscious of Richmond fans, even though the Tigers stopped playing there in 1964.

http://www.realfooty.theage.com.au/realfooty/articles/2006/06/07/1149359818110.html