Preston District Junior Football Assocation

(Image (1958 Atlantic Picture Pageant Card) : Don Furness, 136 games with Fitzroy from 1949, previously with Preston Swimmers and just one of over 100 VFL players who started their footy careers in the PDJFA)

Prior to the Second World War, there were a few “junior” football clubs (in terms of class, but not age-wise) scattered around the town playing in various competitions extending beyond the boundaries of Preston, but not a lot of action for players of perhaps 18 or younger.

The founder of the Preston District Junior Football Association is generally credited to be Cr. Henry Peter Zwar.

For many years a Justice of the Peace, Zwar during the Second World War is said to have become concerned at the number of local youths that were appearing before him in Preston Court on minor charges often arising from simple boredom, and rather than continuing to punish them, decided instead to encourage their participation on their sporting field.

Zwar was the long-standing President of the Preston Football Club, then in recess because of the War, and he enlisted the aid of a vice-president and local hairdresser, Bill Perry and the then assistant secretary Ray Goldspink in establishing a local football competition.

In April, 1944, advertisements appeared in both the Preston Leader and in Melbourne dailies seeking teams interested in joining up with a local under-age competition, ultimately called the Preston District Junior Football Association.

“PRESTON SEEKS JUNIORS

“Preston Football Club intends to promote a junior competition this season, and is anxious to hear from churches, Scouts, and other youth organisations which may be interested. A meeting will be held at the offices of Mr Zwar, MLA, at Cramer St, Preston, on Friday. Mr E. Robinson, of 437 Gilbert rd, West Preston, will supply any information desired”.

The Argus, 1 April, 1944

This led to a meeting of 40 boys and parents, which resulted in the formation of the Preston District Junior Football Association. Zwar, owner of the Parkside tannery alongside the Preston ground was elected President, Perry was elected Treasurer and later Mayor of Preston, Kevin Larkins as Minute Secretary.

There is some doubt as to the first secretary – one report suggests a Mr. Campbell, the family of 1936-36 PFC secretary Les Leach suggest he held the office for the first eight years after foundation. Ray Goldspink went on to hold the corresponding position at Preston for a similar period. “Mr. E. Robinson” is believed to have been Eric “Snowy” Robinson, then the leader of the 1st Preston Scout Troop, one of the inaugural clubs, but his ultimate role in the formation is uncertain.

Unfortunately, much of the history of the competition has been lost through copies of the Leader not being retained on microfilm, but the Association is known to have started with two sections, under 16 (won by Preston Swimmers) and under 18 (Railton Rovers).  Umpires were initially taken from the V.F.A. Pool and it is the reports on the assignment of umpires to specific matches (usually published in The Argus) that gives us the teams in operation.

The initial clubs were Preston Swimmers (Zwar Park), Rivoli (Swain Reserve in Oakover Road just west of Gilbert Road), West Preston Boys (Edwardes Lake Park), Preston Scouts (Haxby Park? later Blake Park), Preston Presbyterians (probably Zwar Park as the church was then in Cramer Street between St. George’s Road and Jessie Street), Railton Rovers (Haxby Park), Preston Boys (Edwardes Park Lake) and East Preston (probably Blake Park).

“Preston Scouts” in the match list is shown as “1st Preston Scouts”, indicating just one troop was initially involved, which, incidentally, is known to have been the first formed in Victoria and quite possibly Australia.

Not surprisingly, the P.D.J.F.A. “grew like Topsy”, and the 1947 Annual Report reveals that just four seasons after its inception, the Association boasted 29 teams, 2,015 registered players, and an under-21 competition (committee meetings were noted as being held in the dining room in Broadhurst’s Tannery, opposite the Park in Cramer Street).

By the early 1980s when the P.D.J.F.A. was at its peak, there were claims that in terms of playing members, it was the largest junior sporting organisation in the world, but sadly, with the rapid change in the ethnic background of the northern suburbs and the spread to areas further out from Melbourne, the competition died a natural death after the 1995 season, although a few clubs continued in other competitions.

The P.D.J.F.A. celebrated its Golden Anniversary in 1994 when seventeen clubs still fielded sides, but that was a final hurrah. Five or six clubs had moved to the Diamond Valley Junior Football League over the preceding couple of seasons and after a final year in 1995, the P.D.J.F.A. folded, some clubs moving to the Diamond Valley, some to other competitions, some just disappearing including the Wanderers club which had existed for fifty years.

The Association used Preston City Oval for their Grand Finals – “use” the operative word with, during the 1960s and 1970s, five matches on both Saturday and Sunday.

Just how many youngsters pulled on a pair of boots in the P.D.J.F.A. is impossible to estimate – the Preston Post-Times carried full results in 1978, perhaps a year or ss when the competition was starting to decline – there was a rival Preston-Reservoir Junior Sunday League with about 40 teams – but from under-10s to a six-club open-age competition, there were 101 teams competing – with a list of perhaps 25, 2,500 in that year alone.