“I am a Foundation Member of the Society, having joined in 1967 as a result of being approached by the Society’s first Secretary – Andrew Joseph – when he discovered that at that time I was a subscriber to Rowland Bowen’s Cricket Quarterly.

I was the second Editor of Scoresheet after John Edwards.  In fact, I edited and produced this Quarterly newsletter from 1968 through to 2019 – a period of fifty-one years.  During most of this period I also served on the Society’s Committee.  I became a Life Member of the Society during Fred Hall’s period as President which I think was the late 1990s.

In terms of my cricket exploits, I played in Carey Grammar School’s premiership side as an off-spin and medium pace bowler in 1949.  After leaving School in 1949 I played for many years with various clubs in the Ringwood and District Cricket Association, mainly as a bowler and tail-end batsman.  Upon retiring from active playing in the 1970s, I umpired in the RDCA competition for about 20 years, retiring in the mid-1990s.

I was a Member of the Melbourne Cricket Club from 1960 to 2016.  I am a life-long supporter of the Melbourne Football Club of which I have been a Member since about 1980.  I have now seen eight of the Club’s thirteen Premierships and look forward to seeing a few more before I pass on into the next World!

I am still vitally interested in the affairs of the Australian Cricket Society.  Upon my retirement from the Editorship of Scoresheet in 2019 I was made a Legend of the Society.”

Steve first played cricket with Trinity Presbyterian Church CC (Eastern Suburban Cricket Association) in 1938 at the age of 14 in their senior team. He served in WWII in the Intelligence area and played with Service teams in Brisbane and New Guinea. After the War, Steve returned to Trinity captaining its ‘A’ Grade team from 1947 to 1953, playing with them for 35 years and playing 386 games as an opening batsman and ‘sometimes’ wicketkeeper. He also served the Club as President, Secretary and Committee member from 1938 until 1980. He also served as Chairman of the Junior Section of the Eastern Suburban Cricket Association from 1978 to 1997 and was a Cricket Umpire from 1981 to 2006. Steve was awarded Life Membership of Trinity and the ESCA and the Australian Sports Medal for his involvement in the game. He was also awarded the OAM for services to Veterans and Sport.

Steve was a Guide at the MCG from 1989 until 2017.

He joined the Australian Cricket Society in 1973 and was Editor of PAVILION from 1978 until 2001. He was a Life Member of the Society and the Young Cricketer of the Year is named in his honour.

Steve passed away on 30th October 2020 at the age of 96.

Roger Page, one of our of our longest serving members and one who over the years has contributed much to the ongoing activities of the Society.  Roger joined the ACS in 1968, approximately one year after the foundation of the ACS in 1967.  From 1974 until 1994 he served on the Society’s committee, serving as Vice President from 1989 until he retired from the committee in 1994.  From the time when he joined the Society back in the late 1960s until well into the 1990s it was his practice to introduce our guests of honour at our annual dinners.  These introductions to the Society’s principal speakers were invariably consummate, thoroughly researched and brilliantly apposite summations of the cricketing careers of our distinguished guests of honour.  Almost everyone in the cricket world knows that Roger runs a highly successful business as a cricket bookseller.  Over the years Roger from time to time donated cricket books to the Society to assist us with door prizes, silent auctions, and the like.  

Roger also serves as the convener of the judging committee which year by year assesses the merits of the various cricket books written by Australian authors and published in this country which are nominated to receive the Society’s Jack Pollard Trophy for the best Australian cricket book written in the period under review.  This has involved Roger in a good deal of work on behalf of the ACS behind the scenes.  He has freely and cheerfully given of his time and expertise on our behalf in a commendable effort to raise the standard of Australian writing about cricket over the years.

Roger, a Taswegian, came to Melbourne in the late 60s to start his Cricket Book Business and took on a part-time job as a casual reporter on District Cricket for The Age.  After three seasons, the Newspaper dispensed with its ‘stringers’, leaving Roger with spare time on his hands on Saturdays.  The Fitzroy CC came to the fore and Roger took on the 1^st XI Scorer’s role with the Club.  While addicted to Cricket he couldn’t envisage lasting as Scorer for 40 seasons – 648 1^st XI matches including three Premierships.

Roger retired as Scorer three seasons ago but he still attends the club’s Home games at Schramms Reserve.

 Neville Turner, a proud son of Lancashire, was President of the Australian Cricket Society from 1998 until 2001.  He was known to entertain with his beloved piano-playing at ACS functions, obliging one and all with their requests.

Neville was an extremely passionate man – a Senior Lecturer in Law and among other interests, President of Oz Child.  His love of Cricket, Soccer and Tennis was unfathomable, he was an accomplished jazz pianist, music lover (except for Rock) and a lover of languages – he spoke five as well as being versed in classical Latin and Greek.

His love of first class Cricket “anything shorter than the three-day game is a facsile perversion of a great art form”.  It took him to 44 different grounds around the world while he watched matches at over a hundred and he was devoted to his beloved Lancashire, even after he emigrated to Australia in 1965.

Neville passed away on 19^th April 2018, aged 81.

Born the year the MCG Test wicket was illegally watered, KEN PIESSE has written and published more than 60 books on cricket and has edited Australian cricket magazines for 45 years.

President of the Australian Cricket Society since 2006, Ken’s best-known books are Cricket’s Colosseum, the first 125 years of Test cricket at the MCG; Pep, the story of Cec Pepper, the best cricketer never to represent Australia and The Encyclopaedia of Australian Test Cricketers.

In 2022 his Fifteen Minutes of Fame, Australia’s 70 One-Test Wonders was acclaimed.

His awards in journalism, TV and radio are numerous. He was inducted into the Melbourne Cricket Club’s Media Hall of Fame in 1999.

His nostalgia series of cricketing biographies which begun in 2012 includes the life stories of Jack Potter, CTB ’Terror’ Turner, Bert Ironmonger, Ted McDonald and Herbie Collins..

Ken lives on Melbourne’s ever-sunny Mornington Peninsula with his wife, puppy and kitten and plays in the thirds and fourths at Mt Eliza CC.

He is a four times winner of the Richard Elvins Trophy for the ACS’s best Over 60s player. He also was judged best overall payer in the Society in 2019-20.

 David Jukes epitomizes what it means to be a dedicated and devoted follower of the game of cricket.  He was one of the Australian Cricket Society’s Foundation Members, being among the very first who attended its very first Meeting in the bowels of the MCG on a wintery evening in 1967.  David served on the Committee, initially under Radcliffe Grace (President) and Andrew Joseph (Secretary) and took on the roles as Membership Secretary and Assistant Treasurer – roles he fulfilled for many years.  David was also instrumental in securing the Charles Lux Pavilion at the Prahran Cricket Ground as the Society’s meeting place for most of its functions during the 1970s.

In more recent years – in 2009, 2013 and 2015, David was an enthusiastic tourist on the Society’s Ashes Tours of England.

In addition to this, David’s love for the game revolved around his beloved Prahran Cricket Club.

David Jukes first entered Toorak Park in 1952, the home of what was to become a lifetime of happiness for him namely Prahran Cricket Club, to see along with his Father their favourite cricketer, Neil Harvey, playing for Fitzroy against Prahran. That’s where it all started.

David then followed Prahran for years after, due to the locality of his home, and in season 1958/59 David was appointed as First Eleven scorer through until 1970 when he then became Honorary Secretary, a position he held for 34 years!! The commitment, effort, love and work he did may be equalled but never bettered as he tirelessly gave of his life to helping the Club and many, many others that passed through it. His honesty was never, ever questioned and the hundreds and hundreds of players who participated during those years, held David in the highest of esteem. This respect was also acknowledged to David from the many officials who served the Club over that period of time.

David Richards who was Secretary, as it was known then, of Cricket Victoria (he later became CEO of Cricket Australia and then likewise at the ICC) was quoted at the time saying that David “was the ‘best’ Club Secretary he had seen as his (David’s) attention to detail, accuracy, reporting on time, plus diligence to a task given, had to be seen to be believed”.

David is a Life Member of Prahran Cricket Club, inducted into the Hall of Fame, a Club Patron and ultimately received Legend status. A most wonderful contributor to the game of cricket, the sport he adores.

A true gentleman, he still loves nothing better than seeing the game played in the spirit it should be.

Wayne joined the Australian Cricket Society in 2010, becoming Secretary in that year, and has been in that role ever since.

“I started playing in the 1961/62 Season playing one Season in Under 16s as a tearaway fast bowler – in my first game I collected 5/10 (geez I must have been quick!) but was well and truely brought down to earth when I was dismissed for a second-ball duck. From memory my bowling stayed reasonably consistent (48 wickets) as did my batting as I rarely bothered the scorers! After an extremely forgettable Season of Senior Cricket with a newly formed Club where we went through the season winless, I joined St Andrews the Club with which I played football. My first Season with St Andrews was memorable – it saw the Club’s first Premiership – I still have my Premiership Cap (geez my head was small in those days!). I played every game and scored 7no and 8no in the Grand Final which took my Season Aggregate to 24 runs, I didn’t bowl a great deal (I think I took about 12 wickets) so my fielding must have been exceptional! After that Season quite a few of our top-order batsmen left so I took the opportunity to open the batting. I must have done a reasonable job as I played that role for 5 Seasons. I also opened the Bowling from that second Season for a few years. In the last few Seasons with St Andrews I batted in the middle order and bowled second or third change. I had also got married and we were living in Chelsea so for the last two Seasons at St Andrews we would train it to Coburg each Saturday morning and return home later that evening. I played 88 games, scored 950 runs and took 168 wickets.

Moving to Frankston, I joined the Frankston East CC and lasted two Seasons – I captained them a few times in my second year. Frustrated with the way the Club was being run, I stood out of Cricket for a year and it was during my time out of the game that the thought of forming a new Club came to mind. With two mates who also stood out of the game that Season, we contacted the various organisations whose approval we required to form our Club. Just prior to the 1974/75 Season the Long Island Cricket Club was formed.

With one team in that first Season I opened both Batting and Bowling on most occasions and we made the Finals. In our second Season we increased our teams to two with the 1st XI winning the Premiership and the 2nd XI runners-up. Unfortunately for me my form petered-out near the end of the Season and I played in the 2nds in the last few games. I was back in the 1st XI the next Season and held my spot over the next four but age and general unfitness combined and I moved gradually down the Grades. I also moved gradually down the Batting order and eventually returned to where it all began – ROSS, W. S batting at #11. My bowling too lost whatever zip it had and after a few Seasons of sending down the occasional mediums I turned to off-spin. After a few games with little success I decided to attempt the “thinking-man’s bowling” – leg-spin. I had a fair amount of success with this, mystifying Batsmen who continually played for the spin only to find how lethal I could deliver the “straight-break”. There were however a few occasions when I did turn the ball – usually when I rapped the Batsman on the pads only to have the Umpire respond to my appeal with “you turned it too much”. I played 206 games (78 in the 1st XI), scored 1850 runs and took 299 wickets and I did get to play in a Premiership when in 1990/91 our 3rd XI chased down 298 runs to win by a wicket. In this game I got the closest I have ever been to a Century in my career when I took 1/96 off 37 overs.

During my 22 years with Long Island I served as Secretary (7 years), President (4 years) and Treasurer (5 years). In the mid 80s I joined the MPCA Board/Executive and served as Pennant Committee Chairman and Senior Vice President for 5 years, then in 1993 became the Association’s General Manager, serving in that role for 9 years. In 2001 while still with the MPCA, I was appointed as Secretary of the Frankston Peninsula CC and two years later when I finished at the MPCA I became its General Manager, serving for 9 years until retiring in 2011. In retirement I have been scoring for the Club including the last eight Seasons as 1st XI Scorer.

I also served for 20 years as Pathways Manager & Scorer for the South East Country Region.”

Awards/Recognitions:
Life Member of the Long Island Cricket Club, the Mornington Peninsula Cricket Association and the Frankston Peninsula Cricket Club.