Talk:History of Australian rules football in Victoria (1859–1900)

Notes

(UTC)I suggest this page be moved to something like Early history of Australian rules football in Victoria, and all efforts be made to tie the article in with History of Australian rules football, Australian rules football in Victoria and so on. JPD (talk) 10:48, 15 October 2007 (UTC) Albert Isaacs 05:41, 16 October 2007 (UTC)
When I decided to set-up this page, I used "Early History of Australian Rules Football in Victoria" as the title (see the "History" page). However, I decided to change the title so as to have 'Australian Rules football' as the lead in. I'd be interested in what other think about the future title of this page.

The name I suggested is in my opinion much more in line with Wikipedia:Naming Conventions. Unless there are objections, I will move the page in a day or two. JPD (talk) 10:40, 24 October 2007 (UTC)

Dear JPD: I appreciate this feedback. While I certainly don't own the page, you've probably noticed that I've put a bit of time and effort into IT. Therefore, I'd like it get prominent coverage and I'll be guided by you on this. Regards, ALBERT. Albert Isaacs 02:06, 25 October 2007 (UTC)

Excellent work Albert. I have rewritten the intro to more accurately reflect the content and moved the page for similar reasons.

It might be a good idea to rewrite it to cover only the period up to 1896 (i.e. foundation of the VFL) and start a History of the Australian Football League with the later material. We could really use a good history of the (old) VFL and AFL. Cheers, Grant | Talk 05:51, 16 November 2007 (UTC)

Looks good, Grant!

I purposely included the formation of the VFL in this history to show that the League didn't grow up in a vacuum. Of course, sometimes the AFL would like everyone to think that there wasn't any football prior to 1897. I think this may change next year (2008) when the AFL plans to celebrate 150 years of football. (My history shows that 1858 may well have been the foundation year, but there's also a good case for saying that it started in 1856 in Geelong.) Albert Isaacs (talk) 01:01, 17 November 2007 (UTC)

The article is a lot of detail, probably too much for one article. It needs to stick to the history of the teams, the rules and only perhaps a bit on the players but it can't be organized with rules, teams, nicknames trivia on players and just random asides everywhere. I've tried moving those asides into notes so that the references stay on point but it's a lot of content that probably goes somewhere else. -- Ricky81682 (talk) 02:37, 23 November 2015 (UTC)

Fantastic Work !

Well done to all involved ! --Spewmaster 00:05, 26 October 2007 (UTC)

Finished Draft

After putting a lot of work into this page over the last few weeks, I have now virtually completed my personal draft, as envisioned. I now look forward to seeing what others are able to contribute.

I have now completed the referencing and indexing, although a small amount of work still has to be done to properly align some of the references.

However, I think that the headnote regarding "missing citations/needs footnotes" should now be removed!

Albert Isaacs 01:28, 28 October 2007 (UTC)

You have to reference reliable sources; you can't cite another wikipedia article as a source. Much of the material in the article is lifted straight from the book by Atkinson, who is not a professional historian but a journalist who relies on stuff written by Cec Mullen in the 1950s. It is accepted that the first scratch matches were played in 1858 (hence the AFL's celebration next year) and the first club was Melbourne, which drew up the rules in 1859 when competition began in earnest. See "Game Of Our Own" by Blainey, or "Running With the Ball" by Mancini & Hibbins. All three are academics who have thoroughly researched their works. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 59.101.228.105 (talk) 08:48, 18 December 2007 (UTC)

Of course, Atkinson is only one of a number of sources cited on this page. Regarding the first year of football (1856 or 1858), I have been very careful not to say that the game was founded in 1856. However, after writing about Tom Will's 1858 "Bell's Life" letter and his umpring of the 1858 Scotch College v Melbourne Grammar game, I then mention that there is another argument that the game had its beginnintgs in Geelong in 1856. Mullen's name is mentioned in this latter context. In other words, the '1858 foundation' argument is given prominance but the contrary case is also mentioned. I consider this to be a valid method of recording history; anything else would show bias. Albert Isaacs (talk) 22:34, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

??? Quote from the article: "Despite what Wills said in his Bell's Life letter, Atkinson also gives convincing evidence of Tom Wills having already helped form a group of no less than six football clubs in Geelong in 1856: Barwon, Bellarine, Corio Bay, Flinders, Kardinia and Moorabool." How could Wills form six clubs in 1856 when he was in England playing cricket at the time? Why would he write to a newspaper in an attempt to form a football club in 1858 if at least one already existed? Non-sensical. So Atkinson, who lived a century later, knows better than Wills himself. Atkinson relies on Mullen for all of this; they are, effectively, the same source. If you are presenting an unbiased assessment of the foundation of the game, then why do the stats tables include a premier team & champion of the colony for 1856 and 1857 as facts? Why is Harrison mentioned as a founder of the game when his first entry into rule-making was the 1866 draft of the rules? The article clearly needs more diverse sources; there are a number around, as mentioned earlier. Another good one is "More Than A Game" by Hess & Stewart. You also need to cite page numbers so people can check on the facts quoted, and not use WP articles as sources; this is against WP policy. Another policy is that articles should be no more than 50-60k long; this one is over 90k at the moment and delves into matters that occurred in the 20th century, when the title of the article clearly states that the time span covered is 1853-1900. Large slabs of the article are lifted, verbatim, from Atkinson's book (written in 1982). There has been much academic work on the subject since, which has been thoroughly researched, and doesn't take the form of Atkinson's "here's some interesting things that happened in footy and some stats I put together" format. 59.101.177.107 (talk) 23:21, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

Dear SineBot,

Should you (or anyone else) wish to soften the references to 1856 and Geelong, that would be fine by me. However, I would hope that some reference to these possible occurences remains. I may have got this article going but I realise that no-one owns any Wikipedia page. In fact, I'm surprised that there haven't been many other contributions to this page, and there certainly haven't been any significant ones.

You ask: "Why do the stats tables include a premier team & champion of the colony for 1856 and 1857 as facts?". The table is headed: "The following clubs are listed in various sources as being the champion clubs" and I then list the sources. I would have hoped that this would have made it clear that the information is not definitve but that I've relied on listed sources.

Regarding Harrison, I've tried to make it clear that he is often regarded as a founder because of his longivity. However, if you believe that this needs further elaboration, that's also fine. You intimate that Harrison made no contribtion to the game until 1866, but there is certainly a possibility that he was involved prior to that. Nevertheless, I've tried to make it clear that is early contribtions are sometimes disputed.

Whilst this is a 19th Century history, obviously there are contextual references to events that occurred in latter years but that had their genesis prior to 1901.

I have thought about splitting the article into two; perhaps pre-1877 and post-1877. Then again, perhaps I'm too close to my original concepts and, therefore, any split may be better done by someone else. If the latter is done, I would hope that I'd consulted during the process.

Let me make it clear that I appreciate your suggestions and advice. That being said, and without being precious, I would have thought that this page fits the Wikipedia guidelines to a greater extent than many other pages that I personally consider to be extremely amateurish. If you check my list of contributions you'll see that I have added or modified a number of pages on diverse subjects, where I feel that I have the knowledge to add to what's already been said. Unfortunately, I've also come across a number of pages that are so incorrect that the only solution that I can see is to a complete rewrite - in these cases, I've usually waived my hands in the air in frsutration and then given up completely and left the offending page(pun indended) as it stands.

Regards,

Albert Isaacs (talk) 00:49, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

I have amended the text in two places, so as to soften the information re. the possible 1856 Geelong formation.

Albert Isaacs (talk) 05:18, 26 December 2007 (UTC)

Pre-history of Australian Rules Football

I don't think the list of Champion clubs should contain any entry prior to 1877. There was no competition to be Premier of so why should there be a list of teams for a non-existent title.

The Champion of the Colony list should be removed altogether. There is no evidence that such an award ever existed. Besides that, having Tom Wills listed as the winner in 1856 is a joke. That year he was playing cricket in England and Ireland until the end of August at least.

The date of Wills' letter to Bell's Life is wrong. It was published on 10 July, not 7 July.

Wills did not umpire/referee the Melbourne Grammar vs Scotch College match on his own.

It was not 1858 when the meeting was held at the Parade Hotel. It was 17 May 1859. That meeting did not lead to the formation of Melbourne as the club was officially formed three days earlier on 14 May 1859.

You rely on Atkinson far too much and misquote his book. The "Good Old Days" chapter does not give evidence for the goldfields at all. He simply questions whether there was any football played there.

The 1856 claims for Wills - Geelong - six clubs are mythical at best. No evidence exists, and as noted above Wills was in England anyway.

The section on the 1859 Geelong rules should be removed. Again, Atkinson is a most unreliable source. I wouldn't believe Mullen either.

RossRSmith (talk) 05:59, 23 February 2008 (UTC)

I personally appreciate the remarks made by Ross R Smith and the recent changes made by Crickettragic. I have made a minor alteration Crickettragic's revised paragraph re. Atkinson's claim of Will forming six clubs in Geelong in 1956. Whereas the sense of what Crickettragic remains, the language has been softened and made less emotive.

Regarding Ross R Smith's claim (above) that there is no evidence of a Champion of the Colony, that the Challenge Cup. I believe that there is much evidence of the Challenge Cup being presented. After a very quick search,, I proffer the following two internet sites: http;//www.electricscotland.com/history/australia/melbourne.htm http://www.footypedia.com/00003247.htm .

Thanks to the assitstance of people like Ross R Smith and Crickettragic, this site is becoming quite authoritative. Albert Isaacs (talk) 23:56, 1 March 2008 (UTC)

Little mark

The article refers to the abolition of a "'little mark" - what was that? Albatross2147 (talk) 02:42, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

The Little Mark is explained in the third-last paragraph of the section,"Formation of the VFL". Albert Isaacs (talk) 22:49, 23 November 2008 (UTC)

Timeframe

What is significant about the year 1900 in regards to football in Victoria? Seems rather arbitrary. 1859-1897 (pre-VFL) would make more sense. - HappyWaldo (talk) 18:27, 22 April 2013 (UTC)

I agree. It would make more sense to keep pre-VFL and VFL as separate histories with the formation of the VFL discussion into the VFL article as background. Else, this is just a lengthy mess. -- Ricky81682 (talk) 06:18, 14 December 2015 (UTC)

Recording of points

In this edit, @Albert Isaacs: removed the citations needed about the early lack of recording of points stating that "The early method of recording points is already noted under "Formation of the VFA". However, the Formation of the VFA section states

From 1878, points were listed but only goals counted towards the score and, therefore, there were a great number of drawn games. Even though behinds did not count towards a result, in 1893 the VFA awarded the Stars and Stripes Trophy to the team kicking the least number of behinds in ratio to the number of goals scored in premiership matches. This was done to encourage accurate kicking for goal. Melbourne won the trophy with a percentage of 78.6, barely ahead of Williamstown at 78.5.[20] The unusual Trophy name comes from the fact that the Trophy was awarded by Messrs Jacobs, Hart & Co., manufacturers of Stars and Stripes cigarettes.[21]

Is footnote 20 (Seagulls Over Williamstown without a page citation) supposed to be for the facts that (a) points were listed but only goals counted; (b) behinds did not count; (c) in 1893 the VFA award went by a scoring based on least number of behinds / number of goal scored (for whatever reason) (d) done to encourage accurate kicking for goals and (e) Melbourne's trophy win over Williamstown? It seems like just (e) to me the way it's written. I don't think it's a crazy idea to actual reference the citations in more detail if we have them as that particular paragraph says a number of things that could be expanded if needed. -- Ricky81682 (talk) 06:15, 14 December 2015 (UTC)

Nicknames

As I noted above, this article needs to stick to the actual topic of the history, focusing on the rules and only perhaps a bit on the players but it's incoherent to have rules, teams, nicknames, trivia on players and just random piece after random piece. There exists List of nicknames used in Australian rules football so I removed the nicknames from here again. -- Ricky81682 (talk) 06:22, 14 December 2015 (UTC)

I also note that there are no sources for any of the nicknames in contrast to the nicknames article which has sources for everything there. -- Ricky81682 (talk) 06:37, 14 December 2015 (UTC)

Dear Ricky 81682,

Thank you for your comments. Obviously, you spent a lot of time a week or so back, making many, many changes to this Wikipedia page. You will note that I have made just a few reversions. However, most of your modifications were good.

Regarding Nicknames: I would argue that they ARE part of history because of their importance in the saga of each club. This is particularly so, today, when many people (particularly in the media) have adopted the American habit of including the kickname in the actual name of the team. Even so, I have to admit that I didn't realise that there was a Wikipedia page covering nicknames. The obvious compromise is to include a link to this page on the 1859-1900 History page. I will also look at the nickname page and see if I can add any nicknames.

With thanks,Albert Isaacs (talk) 22:35, 14 December 2015 (UTC)

I think they are too but the article goes and wanders if you can't keep it in one place. I'd prefer we have separate lists for lists of places for Australian rules football and similar articles which would allow for some background on where nicknames came from, etc. I think our end goal is the same of course, getting this article up in quality so it's helpful and useful to most people. You're doing the real work, I'm just trying work around the edges here. -- Ricky81682 (talk) 23:27, 14 December 2015 (UTC)

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Help! What has happened to this page?

What has happened to the article on Aussie Rules Football 1959-1900? Readers find themselves on the general history page, with no hint as to what has happened to the 1859-1900 page. Very strange! Can anyone offer an explanation.

Perhaps you can contact me via my Wikipedia page. ThanksAlbert Isaacs (talk) 06:31, 14 July 2021 (UTC)

@Albert Isaacs: Have you looked at the article history? --David Biddulph (talk) 07:26, 14 July 2021 (UTC)