Episode 60 - Official and unofficial songs; the nature of soccer in 1880s Melbourne

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There's always new stuff on Trove, wouldn't you know? Then there's the clean-up, including the way that our little network helped a previous guest with finding out information about a little known league from Melbourne's far-eastern suburbs in the 1950s. 

We also have a ramshackle discussion about Australian club songs - not post-match victory songs, but rather official and unofficial club anthems - prompted by a discussion on Twitter on the Canberra Cosmos' supporters CD. We look at the existence of such as songs as:

• Newcastle KB
• Canberra City
• Sydney and/or Melbourne Croatia
• APIA Liechhardt
• Melbourne Victory's Terrace Punk Band
• and several others.

And the different motivations for creating official and unofficial songs depending on the era of Australian soccer.

We finish up the first segment by looking at a photo of people kicking a soccer ball at Gallipoli - what are they doing?

In 100 Years Ago Today, we take a lengthy look at a big fundraising soccer match in Mount Barker in South Australia, and the social events held thereafter, while also wondering why there's no match report for the men's vs women's match; and we head to Sydney where the season just seems to be dragging on interminably, and thus we discuss comparing the length of a typical soccer season in Sydney to its rugby league counterpart; then to Newcastle, where  the long-drawn-out soccer season has seen Adamstown's cricket team forfeit matches; then we run out of time to talk about everything else because of poor time management.

In the final segment, we revisit the 1880s in Victoria. A few episodes ago, Ian looked at new discoveries which pushed the supposed end date of the first phase of Melbourne soccer a little further than previously assumed; now to the 1880s, where Ian has found more games, and more kinds of fixtures (including north vs south of the Yarra games). We also start discussing the demographic make-up of 1880s Melbourne soccer, including people such as the future premier of Victoria, Thomas Bent, and the what the membership numbers mean in terms of how the soccer club operates within playing and social spheres. Oh, and speculation on the possible effect of the 1890s economic depression on the kinds of people involved with Melbourne soccer at the time, as well as how social class shaped early Melbourne soccer. There's also horse riders complain about soccer goalposts, and the public usage of the precinct known as Yarra Park.