When did you first fall in love with Jessie Menzies?DB: Err, I think that would be the day she came to live with us when I was about 12 years of age. I remember the day very well because I had been sent down the street by my mother on a mission to buy some groceries, and I ran into the doctor's car...on my bike, and had an
accident. He had to take me home, I had my nose all cut and scratches all over my face. And when I got home she was there at the door, having just been delivered by her father, because she was going to
stay with us for 12 months and go to school. And we went to school together every day for the rest of that year. That was when I fell in love with her, that very first day. I don't think she fell in love
with me until much later, because I was a terrible sight the day she saw me.
RM: (laughs) Did you decide then you were going to marry her?
DB: (smiles) No, no not quite then..but very shortly afterwards.
RM: But she turned you down first up, in 1932..?
DB: No, no, she didn't turn me down then..just postponed it.
RM: I see, but you wanted to marry her before you went on the 1930 tour?
DB: No I only wanted to be engaged, I didn't want to get married.
RM: And she said no?
DB: She said "Wait until you get back from England, and if you still feel the same way, talk to me again."
RM: And you did?
DB: And I did, straight away..as soon as I got back.
RM: Could you have done all this without Jessie?
DB: No, no..no way in the world, no way in the world. She's the most
marvellous woman who ever existed
-----------------
Can I ask you the story about the missing engagement ring?
DB: Well it's a bit of a mystery (sips water) Yes, I brought her a nice engagement ring..single diamond, with a couple of diamonds each side, and one day she reported to me that she couldn't find it. And so we racked our brains and searched everywhere, but we couldn't find it. So we finally came to the conclusion that she'd taken it off while
preparing some vegetables, and it had been thrown out. And that was the end of it and we couldn't find it anywhere..this went on for about 20 years, and then one day I was scratching around in the garden, up in the backyard, and I suddenly saw something glint in the sunlight. I turned it over, and it was a ring. I picked this ring up, and it
looked like one of the rings the kids get at the show. I took it inside and said to my wife "Do you recognize this, did one of the kids get it in a showbag or something like that?" She took one look and said "Good gracious, that's my ngagement ring". It turns out it had
been thrown out in the rubbish, it had gone through the incinerator, it had gone through the vegetable garden, and I accidently scratched it up on a gravel path. So we got it restored and she wears it today, absolutely beautiful. A miracle.
RM: (laughs) Was she the boss?
DB: She always has been.
=============================
Don Bradman: In retrospect I think my feeling is one of gratitude that I was given such a great opportunity through sport to serve my country. As a boy I had no idea that my career would develop in this fashion, I just simply loved playing cricket as a sport, and I can truthfully say that it was a labour of love. I continued to play it as a sport throughout the whole of my career. I was not in a position of
power; my parents were humble country folk, they had no wealth or influence. Any success I had was purely the result of my own talents, and I�m gratified for the reason that I think my life can be seen as
an example to the youth of Australia in proving that any person from any walk of life has the opportunity, if he cares to grasp it.
SONG: Bradman
Now shadows grow longer, and there�s so much more yet to be told
But we�re not getting any younger, so let the part tell the whole
Now the players all wear colours, the circus is in town
And I no longer can go down there, down to that sacred ground
He was more than just a batsman, he�s something like a tide
More than just one man, he was half the bloody side
Fathers took their sons �cos fortune used to hide
In the palm of his hands; in the palm of his hands
Bradman (Part II )
================================================== =========
Fingleton on Bradman:
His batting stance was unique. His bat touched the ground between his feet, not behind them, like every other batsman and photograph I have seen. He stood perfectly still as the bowler approached; the end of his bat did not act as an escape conductor for energy with that
nervous tap, tap, tap on the pitch so common to most batsmen as the
bowler ran to deliver the ball.''
``He was at once the despair of the bowlers, the captain and his fieldsmen, the batting worthy struggling at the other end and his comrades in the pavilion. He made it all look so easy, so simple, so
pre-arranged. He always made the nlooker feel that a loose ball would
be lifted for four to the very place on the boundary to which science required that ball should be sent''.
``His genius was absolute. To bat with him was an education and revelation, not given by any other batsman of the period. Great artists like Trumper and Macartney varied the direction of the shot for sheer artistic satisfaction but Bradman was implacable. He was more interested in runs than art, and in the days when he was playing for Australia you would have searched a long time before you found an
onlooker who seriously disagreed with him. He was the undisputed hero
of the new-found public, the broadcasting public. He was the darling of the spectator's heart - and justifiably so, because no batsman in history had been so prolific and none of the moderns could approach the standard he set for consistency and sheer honesty of batting
purpose.''
And Jack Fingleton concludes, ``All bowlers with the possible exception of O'Reilly, whom he first met in a country game, came alike to Bradman. At one time or another he took up Tate, Larwood (before bodyline), Geary, Voce, Freeman, Verity, Constantine, Francis, Griffiths, Grimmett, Fleetwood-Smith, Ebeling, Blackie, Ironmonger, Oxenham, Quinn, Bell, Morkel, McMillan, and the rest of the world's best. He was wary and respectful always with O'Reilly, but the others
he closely analysed and then slashed them apart before he left them
bewildered, abashed and out of breath.''
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
account in Fingleton' Cricket Crisis of Bradman's "cold and deliberate
cricket murder" of Mailey's bowling in a charity match - a charity match! - in the early 1930s, motivated by a newspaper story on the eve of the match, suggests little charity in Bradman's ego.
Wrote Fingleton: "A statistician found Mailey, then a cricket veteran, had taken Bradman's wicket several times. The newspapers displayed the fact. [But] it meant for Mailey his offering on the sacrificial altar of Bradman's greatness, for the little chap never missed a cricket
item ... Bradman put Mailey in the stocks that day for all to see. He hanged, drew and quartered him. Mailey was butchered to make another Bradman holiday."
================================================== ====
Great Australian Cricket Stories by Neil Marks, the former NSW cricketer and selector who has made a second career as an author and raconteur of sports yarns.
Marks' father Alec, better known as Acka, was also a forceful NSW batsman in his prime and became close mates with his young team-mate Bradman.
There is the story of Acka, an expert snooker player, beating the novice Bradman in a friendly game.
Five years later, when Bradman had moved to Adelaide, he invited Acka
to his home when the two were playing a Shield match against each other.
After dinner Bradman led the way to a full-sized snooker table � and wiped the table with his guest. He had been plotting his revenge for years.
Another story relates how Acka worked on his bowling and was on the verge of selection as an all-rounder on an Ashes tour.
In the final trial match against Bradman's team he scored 83 and then was given a bowl. His good mate Bradman smashed him all over the park, ending any tour hopes.
When Acka remarked jokingly that radman could have gone easy on him
and got his friend on the boat, Bradman answered seriously: "It never dawned on me."
Finally Acka did make an Australian Test squad, captained by Bradman, who was also a selector, as 12th man.
It was the highlight of his career and he was justifiably chuffed. Then Bradman deflated him by saying he had pulled strings to get Acka into the side, securing him match payment as a "wedding present".
As Neil Marks wrote, Bradman never realised how much he had hurt his
friend.
No, The Don wasn't a god, just a bloke.
================================================== =======
Cardus on Don:
At Adelaide, at close of play on a hot day on which Donald Bradman amassed 212, I asked Bill Voce, the Nottinghamshire and England fast left-handed bowler: "What's the best ball to bowl at 'The Don'?" Out
of his heart, Bill replied: "There's no ruddy best ball to bowl at him."
Bradman scored a century on his first appearance in first-class cricket. One of the opposing bowlers, a famous Australian captain, was asked after his baptism of Bradman: "What's this new young cove like?"
"He belts hell out of everything he can reach," was the reply, which, I think, can be taken as the most eloquent of all ways of describing Bradman's batting. He was a killer of all kind of bowling, given a good pitch to play on.
A splendid South African bowler told me that, at Adelaide, Bradman hit him for three fours in one of his first overs, the ball still new. His captain thereupon asked: "What's the matter?" The bowler answered: "Well, if you really want to know, he's just hit for hellfire fours
three of the best balls I've ever bowled in my life."
----
Cardus adds in a different context,'' one afternoon I was walking along Whiteall I saw a newspaper placard: ``Bradman Fails'' and in the stop press I read, ``Bradman b Ryan 58
================================================== =======
when the Don scored 334 runs in a 1930 Test at Leeds, and a London newspaper finally trumpeted just two grateful words on posters around the city: "HE'S OUT!"
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Micheal Henderson with a fancy story
Nevertheless, I think I have a beauty. It was told to me by the great Australian batsman, Dean Jones, who positively swore on the head of his daughter it happened, and I have since been told that Merv Hughes also confirms its truth.
The scene is set at a Test match between Australia and the West Indies at Adelaide Oval back in February 1989. These were the days when the Windies were the greatest power the cricketing world had ever seen, the days when they used to select 11 fast bowlers in the team and a
12th man who was a fast bowler just to be on the safe side.
And it was into just such a furnace that the young bowler Mervyn Hughes walked - with bat in hand. Figuring fortune favoured the brave, Hughes wielded the willow like an axeman his axe, and somehow - after snicking fortutiously, connecting full-bloodedly, and missing entirely - he finished the day's play at 72 not out.
The tradition in Test cricket is that the batting side take a few beers into the fielding side's dressing-room afterwards, but not on this evening. Instead, Merv took an ice-box full of bottles, so keen
was he to give the men of the Windies the full blow-by-blow account of every run he'd made. So it was that half an hour later, Jones - who himself had contributed 216 - and Hughes and several other Australian players were in the Windies dressing-room, when a sudden hush fell
upon the gathering.
They looked to the door and there was Sir Donald Bradman himself, being ushered into the room by several South Australian cricket officials. The Don had expressed a desire to meet this mighty team, and now here he was.
For the next 15 minutes or so, the great man was introduced to the visiting players, with each West Indian standing up well before Sir Donald got to their position on the bench. Then, when their time came, they warmly shook his hand and had a few words.
This all proceeded splendidly until Sir Donald got to the last man on the bench, Patrick Patterson - the fastest bowler in the world at that time. So the story goes, not only did Patterson not stand, he simply squinted quizzically up at the octogenarian. Finally, after some 30 seconds of awkward silence, Patterson stood up, all two metres of pure whip-cord steel of him, and looked down at the diminutive Don.
"You, Don Bradman!?!" he snorted. "You, Don Bradman?!?! I kill you, mun! I bowl at you, I kill you! I split you in two!"
In reply, Sir Donald, with his hands on his hips, gazed squarely back at Patterson and calmly retorted: "You couldn't even get Merv Hughes out. You'd have no chance against me, mate!"
More stories on Bradman.
====================
Bradman: Oh yes, that's a great story, that happened the other day.
I'd been having a round of golf and was driving home quietly about 3 o'clock. The strange thing was it was alongside Victoria Park racecourse, near the grand prix circuit. I was actually driving on the
grand prix circuit and the policeman waved me down, there were no other cars in the vicinity at all. I thought he'd broken down and wanted some help. And when he pulled me over he said "I'm sorry but you've been exceeding the speed limit." I said "No I'm not, the speed
limit's 80 (kmhs) here, and I was only doing about 70." He said "No it's not, it's 60 and my radar gun says you were exceeding the speed limit, you were doing 72." Then he said "Have you got your licence with you," so I pulled out the
wallet and produced it to him. He got out his book and began to make some notes, then he said "Are you Sir Donald radman?" I said yes, that's right, and he said "it's an honour and a privilege to meet you," and I said "Well I'm very sorry I can't say the same to you."
RM: (laughs) Did he book you?
DB: He certainly did, I went away $173 poorer and a lot wiser.
RM: So there's a policeman in South Australia who had been brazen
enough to book Donald Bradman?
DB: Yes, well that proves that there are no corrupts in the police force in South Australia (laughs)
RM: Are you a speed merchant by nature?
DB: Well no I'm not, I'm such a slow driver that theres a story in our family...we were driving to town one day, and my daughter said to me "What's the matter Dad, are we driving into a head wind?" (laughs)
Thats my reputation as a driver.
=========================================
Ram Guha on Bradman
The Don never played in this country, but was adored here nevertheless. He retired in 1948, and five years later decided to make another visit to England, as a ournalist. As it happens, his aircraft
made an unscheduled stopover at Kolkata's Dum Dum airport. Word got
around, somehow, and within minutes there were 5,000 cricket-crazy Indians on the tarmac, screaming for him. Bradman hastily got into an army jeep and took refuge in a barricaded building.
--------------
My feelings regarding Vivian Richards were anticipated by a Yorkshire
cricket lover watching Don Bradman in the summer of 1948. He loved him, for his brilliant batsmanship, and hated him, for all those runs scored against his side. As Bradman walked off the Headingley ground for the last time, having hit 173 not out to take Australia to an emphatic victory, this Yorkshireman stopped the foreign foe on the pavilion steps. Eyes brimming with tears - tears of anger and of admiration - he spoke the two words that best expressed his complex
emotions: "Yer booger!"
--------------
Some years later(after the record 499, by Hanif Mohammed ) the Pakistani cricket team toured Australia. When they played South Australia at Adelaide, Sir Donald Bradman walked into their dressing
room and asked to meet the man who had broken his record score of 452.
Hanif got up, and apologetically said, ''Sir, you will always be the greatest.'' The Don looked him up and down and replied, shaking his head: ''So you are the fellow. I always thought that the batsman who
broke my record would be six feet two inches tall. But you are shorter
than me!''
==================================================
When the city of Adelaide decided to rename a street for Sir Don, several businesses on the strip tried to cash in on the cricketer's reputation-for example, the Ultimate Risk Sex Shop intended to rename itself "Erotica on Bradman" but changed its mind after a wave of negative publicity. Eventually, the Australian government changed the law to prevent businesses from using Bradman's name to suggest a commercial connection.
===============================================
Teetotal and a non- smoker, when possible he avoided rowdy celebration, although as a talented pianist he would occasionally be roped in to accompany sing-songs. After he made 309 not out on the first day of the Test match at eadingley in 1930, against an attack
including Larwood and Tate, he went up to his room to listen to music and write letters all evening.
Some of his team-mates resented this attitude. In particular, the Irish and Roman Catholic members of Australia's side in the 1930s - Jack Fingleton and Bill O'Reilly to the fore - took exception to the
tight, dedicated, Empire-loving, Royalty-idolising, aristocrat-appreciating genius under whose shadow they lay.
``A churlish little man,'' Fingleton called Bradman in 1980, all passion clearly not spent
---------------------------------------
In May 1941 Bradman was discharged from the Army on medical grounds. A
frozen shoulder left him unable to lift his right arm. He also lost all feeling in the thumb and index finger of his right hand; it never returned, he wrote in his book Farewell to Cricket (1950).
For the rest of the war Bradman busied himself with his work on the Adelaide stock exchange, on which he bought a seat in 1943. But even this occupation proved fraught, as Harry Hodgett, his boss, was imprisoned for fraud in 1945. Bradman worked hard and successfully to
restore the position of the firm, which now traded as Don Bradman and Company. During this period, he recorded, ``cricket never crossed my
mind.''
...He continued to work as a stockbroker until 1954 when he announced,
rather curiously, that his doctor had advised him to retire.
Fingleton on Bradman:
His batting stance was unique. His bat touched the ground between his feet, not behind them, like every other batsman and photograph I have seen. He stood perfectly still as the bowler approached; the end of his bat did not act as an escape conductor for energy with that
nervous tap, tap, tap on the pitch so common to most batsmen as the
bowler ran to deliver the ball.''
``He was at once the despair of the bowlers, the captain and his fieldsmen, the batting worthy struggling at the other end and his comrades in the pavilion. He made it all look so easy, so simple, so
pre-arranged. He always made the nlooker feel that a loose ball would
be lifted for four to the very place on the boundary to which science required that ball should be sent''.
``His genius was absolute. To bat with him was an education and revelation, not given by any other batsman of the period. Great artists like Trumper and Macartney varied the direction of the shot for sheer artistic satisfaction but Bradman was implacable. He was more interested in runs than art, and in the days when he was playing for Australia you would have searched a long time before you found an
onlooker who seriously disagreed with him. He was the undisputed hero
of the new-found public, the broadcasting public. He was the darling of the spectator's heart - and justifiably so, because no batsman in history had been so prolific and none of the moderns could approach the standard he set for consistency and sheer honesty of batting
purpose.''
And Jack Fingleton concludes, ``All bowlers with the possible exception of O'Reilly, whom he first met in a country game, came alike to Bradman. At one time or another he took up Tate, Larwood (before bodyline), Geary, Voce, Freeman, Verity, Constantine, Francis, Griffiths, Grimmett, Fleetwood-Smith, Ebeling, Blackie, Ironmonger, Oxenham, Quinn, Bell, Morkel, McMillan, and the rest of the world's best. He was wary and respectful always with O'Reilly, but the others
he closely analysed and then slashed them apart before he left them
bewildered, abashed and out of breath.''
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
account in Fingleton' Cricket Crisis of Bradman's "cold and deliberate
cricket murder" of Mailey's bowling in a charity match - a charity match! - in the early 1930s, motivated by a newspaper story on the eve of the match, suggests little charity in Bradman's ego.
Wrote Fingleton: "A statistician found Mailey, then a cricket veteran, had taken Bradman's wicket several times. The newspapers displayed the fact. [But] it meant for Mailey his offering on the sacrificial altar of Bradman's greatness, for the little chap never missed a cricket
item ... Bradman put Mailey in the stocks that day for all to see. He hanged, drew and quartered him. Mailey was butchered to make another Bradman holiday."
================================================== ====
Great Australian Cricket Stories by Neil Marks, the former NSW cricketer and selector who has made a second career as an author and raconteur of sports yarns.
Marks' father Alec, better known as Acka, was also a forceful NSW batsman in his prime and became close mates with his young team-mate Bradman.
There is the story of Acka, an expert snooker player, beating the novice Bradman in a friendly game.
Five years later, when Bradman had moved to Adelaide, he invited Acka
to his home when the two were playing a Shield match against each other.
After dinner Bradman led the way to a full-sized snooker table � and wiped the table with his guest. He had been plotting his revenge for years.
Another story relates how Acka worked on his bowling and was on the verge of selection as an all-rounder on an Ashes tour.
In the final trial match against Bradman's team he scored 83 and then was given a bowl. His good mate Bradman smashed him all over the park, ending any tour hopes.
When Acka remarked jokingly that radman could have gone easy on him
and got his friend on the boat, Bradman answered seriously: "It never dawned on me."
Finally Acka did make an Australian Test squad, captained by Bradman, who was also a selector, as 12th man.
It was the highlight of his career and he was justifiably chuffed. Then Bradman deflated him by saying he had pulled strings to get Acka into the side, securing him match payment as a "wedding present".
As Neil Marks wrote, Bradman never realised how much he had hurt his
friend.
No, The Don wasn't a god, just a bloke.
================================================== =======
Cardus on Don:
At Adelaide, at close of play on a hot day on which Donald Bradman amassed 212, I asked Bill Voce, the Nottinghamshire and England fast left-handed bowler: "What's the best ball to bowl at 'The Don'?" Out
of his heart, Bill replied: "There's no ruddy best ball to bowl at him."
Bradman scored a century on his first appearance in first-class cricket. One of the opposing bowlers, a famous Australian captain, was asked after his baptism of Bradman: "What's this new young cove like?"
"He belts hell out of everything he can reach," was the reply, which, I think, can be taken as the most eloquent of all ways of describing Bradman's batting. He was a killer of all kind of bowling, given a good pitch to play on.
A splendid South African bowler told me that, at Adelaide, Bradman hit him for three fours in one of his first overs, the ball still new. His captain thereupon asked: "What's the matter?" The bowler answered: "Well, if you really want to know, he's just hit for hellfire fours
three of the best balls I've ever bowled in my life."
----
Cardus adds in a different context,'' one afternoon I was walking along Whiteall I saw a newspaper placard: ``Bradman Fails'' and in the stop press I read, ``Bradman b Ryan 58
================================================== =======
when the Don scored 334 runs in a 1930 Test at Leeds, and a London newspaper finally trumpeted just two grateful words on posters around the city: "HE'S OUT!"
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Micheal Henderson with a fancy story
Nevertheless, I think I have a beauty. It was told to me by the great Australian batsman, Dean Jones, who positively swore on the head of his daughter it happened, and I have since been told that Merv Hughes also confirms its truth.
The scene is set at a Test match between Australia and the West Indies at Adelaide Oval back in February 1989. These were the days when the Windies were the greatest power the cricketing world had ever seen, the days when they used to select 11 fast bowlers in the team and a
12th man who was a fast bowler just to be on the safe side.
And it was into just such a furnace that the young bowler Mervyn Hughes walked - with bat in hand. Figuring fortune favoured the brave, Hughes wielded the willow like an axeman his axe, and somehow - after snicking fortutiously, connecting full-bloodedly, and missing entirely - he finished the day's play at 72 not out.
The tradition in Test cricket is that the batting side take a few beers into the fielding side's dressing-room afterwards, but not on this evening. Instead, Merv took an ice-box full of bottles, so keen
was he to give the men of the Windies the full blow-by-blow account of every run he'd made. So it was that half an hour later, Jones - who himself had contributed 216 - and Hughes and several other Australian players were in the Windies dressing-room, when a sudden hush fell
upon the gathering.
They looked to the door and there was Sir Donald Bradman himself, being ushered into the room by several South Australian cricket officials. The Don had expressed a desire to meet this mighty team, and now here he was.
For the next 15 minutes or so, the great man was introduced to the visiting players, with each West Indian standing up well before Sir Donald got to their position on the bench. Then, when their time came, they warmly shook his hand and had a few words.
This all proceeded splendidly until Sir Donald got to the last man on the bench, Patrick Patterson - the fastest bowler in the world at that time. So the story goes, not only did Patterson not stand, he simply squinted quizzically up at the octogenarian. Finally, after some 30 seconds of awkward silence, Patterson stood up, all two metres of pure whip-cord steel of him, and looked down at the diminutive Don.
"You, Don Bradman!?!" he snorted. "You, Don Bradman?!?! I kill you, mun! I bowl at you, I kill you! I split you in two!"
In reply, Sir Donald, with his hands on his hips, gazed squarely back at Patterson and calmly retorted: "You couldn't even get Merv Hughes out. You'd have no chance against me, mate!"
More stories on Bradman.
====================
Bradman: Oh yes, that's a great story, that happened the other day.
I'd been having a round of golf and was driving home quietly about 3 o'clock. The strange thing was it was alongside Victoria Park racecourse, near the grand prix circuit. I was actually driving on the
grand prix circuit and the policeman waved me down, there were no other cars in the vicinity at all. I thought he'd broken down and wanted some help. And when he pulled me over he said "I'm sorry but you've been exceeding the speed limit." I said "No I'm not, the speed
limit's 80 (kmhs) here, and I was only doing about 70." He said "No it's not, it's 60 and my radar gun says you were exceeding the speed limit, you were doing 72." Then he said "Have you got your licence with you," so I pulled out the
wallet and produced it to him. He got out his book and began to make some notes, then he said "Are you Sir Donald radman?" I said yes, that's right, and he said "it's an honour and a privilege to meet you," and I said "Well I'm very sorry I can't say the same to you."
RM: (laughs) Did he book you?
DB: He certainly did, I went away $173 poorer and a lot wiser.
RM: So there's a policeman in South Australia who had been brazen
enough to book Donald Bradman?
DB: Yes, well that proves that there are no corrupts in the police force in South Australia (laughs)
RM: Are you a speed merchant by nature?
DB: Well no I'm not, I'm such a slow driver that theres a story in our family...we were driving to town one day, and my daughter said to me "What's the matter Dad, are we driving into a head wind?" (laughs)
Thats my reputation as a driver.
=========================================
Ram Guha on Bradman
The Don never played in this country, but was adored here nevertheless. He retired in 1948, and five years later decided to make another visit to England, as a ournalist. As it happens, his aircraft
made an unscheduled stopover at Kolkata's Dum Dum airport. Word got
around, somehow, and within minutes there were 5,000 cricket-crazy Indians on the tarmac, screaming for him. Bradman hastily got into an army jeep and took refuge in a barricaded building.
--------------
My feelings regarding Vivian Richards were anticipated by a Yorkshire
cricket lover watching Don Bradman in the summer of 1948. He loved him, for his brilliant batsmanship, and hated him, for all those runs scored against his side. As Bradman walked off the Headingley ground for the last time, having hit 173 not out to take Australia to an emphatic victory, this Yorkshireman stopped the foreign foe on the pavilion steps. Eyes brimming with tears - tears of anger and of admiration - he spoke the two words that best expressed his complex
emotions: "Yer booger!"
--------------
Some years later(after the record 499, by Hanif Mohammed ) the Pakistani cricket team toured Australia. When they played South Australia at Adelaide, Sir Donald Bradman walked into their dressing
room and asked to meet the man who had broken his record score of 452.
Hanif got up, and apologetically said, ''Sir, you will always be the greatest.'' The Don looked him up and down and replied, shaking his head: ''So you are the fellow. I always thought that the batsman who
broke my record would be six feet two inches tall. But you are shorter
than me!''
==================================================
When the city of Adelaide decided to rename a street for Sir Don, several businesses on the strip tried to cash in on the cricketer's reputation-for example, the Ultimate Risk Sex Shop intended to rename itself "Erotica on Bradman" but changed its mind after a wave of negative publicity. Eventually, the Australian government changed the law to prevent businesses from using Bradman's name to suggest a commercial connection.
===============================================
Teetotal and a non- smoker, when possible he avoided rowdy celebration, although as a talented pianist he would occasionally be roped in to accompany sing-songs. After he made 309 not out on the first day of the Test match at eadingley in 1930, against an attack
including Larwood and Tate, he went up to his room to listen to music and write letters all evening.
Some of his team-mates resented this attitude. In particular, the Irish and Roman Catholic members of Australia's side in the 1930s - Jack Fingleton and Bill O'Reilly to the fore - took exception to the
tight, dedicated, Empire-loving, Royalty-idolising, aristocrat-appreciating genius under whose shadow they lay.
``A churlish little man,'' Fingleton called Bradman in 1980, all passion clearly not spent
---------------------------------------
In May 1941 Bradman was discharged from the Army on medical grounds. A
frozen shoulder left him unable to lift his right arm. He also lost all feeling in the thumb and index finger of his right hand; it never returned, he wrote in his book Farewell to Cricket (1950).
For the rest of the war Bradman busied himself with his work on the Adelaide stock exchange, on which he bought a seat in 1943. But even this occupation proved fraught, as Harry Hodgett, his boss, was imprisoned for fraud in 1945. Bradman worked hard and successfully to
restore the position of the firm, which now traded as Don Bradman and Company. During this period, he recorded, ``cricket never crossed my
mind.''
...He continued to work as a stockbroker until 1954 when he announced,
rather curiously, that his doctor had advised him to retire.
---------
Bradman on sledging:
"I played under Alan Kippax in New South Wales for some time, I played under Jack Ryder in the Test series in 28-29, I played under Bill Woodfull in 1930 until he retired, and I captained the side until I
retired. And in the whole of that time, I don't recall one single incident of sledging. It never occurred, and it would not have occurred because it would not have been allowed, not one of those
captains would have allowed it. If it had happened under me I would have given the fellow one warni ng, and if it had happened again I would have made sure he was not selected again.... it never went on in my day, not at all, and I don't think it should happen now."
=======================================
Give him 300 and ask him to go out,'' shouted a spectator at the
Australians v Worcestershire match in 1934 during Don Bradman's
innings of 206, the second of the three consecutive double centuries
he made against that County. A lady watching the Don score 452 not out
in 415 minutes for NSW against Queensland on January 30, 1930,
remarked ``Why don't they let someone else have a turn? I am sick of
looking at him.''
That the Don was a nightmare to the bowlers is revealed in a despatch
by Arthur Mailey in 1949. He wrote ``I felt sorry for those bowlers
who were and will be up tomorrow against Bradman. Breaking through his
defence is even more difficult than getting clearance from the
Taxation Department.I've tried both.''
===============================================
Bill O Reilly on Don:
There's never been and never will be in my estimation a batsman so
good as that fella. I don't care how many you like to pour into one -
all the Chappells, the Borders and so on. Forget them, they're just
child's play compared with Bradman, and I've seen them all. Bradman
was a bloke whose ability with the bat was absolutely inconceivable.
The Yanks talk about Babe Ruth and all that. To hell with Babe Ruth.
This boy was a modern miracle.''
================================================== =====
John Bradman, the son on his father :
I recall one night just after I'd gone to bed, I heard this wailing coming from his room and I ran in to find him jumping up and down slapping himself. He'd hopped into bed and had been bitten by a swarm
of bees ... the Department of Agriculture had a special unit that dealt with bees.
"So the next morning he rang them up and said my name is Don Bradman
and I've got some bees in my cavity wall. And as quick as a flash the bloke on the phone said: `Well my name is Bill Smith and I've got bats in the belfry' and hung up. The poor fellow thought it was a joke.''
--
Mr Bradman reiterated his belief that his father should not be so revered that he becomes god-like. "I was in the State Library recently where some of his things are in a collection ... one item is a rug
which used to be on the floor of my room. It's in the design of the Australian blazer pocket and it has a dark green ackground and in this dark green background are some faded patches. "I was standing next to some people and they were discussing these pale patches in hushed tones and with almost reverential significance ... I could have
told them they were the patches where my little dog had peed on it.''
================================================== =
Captaincy stories
'Bradman could read a batsman and tell you how to bowl to him, but he did it obliquely, as with Bill Edrich, who tended to play across the line, at Lord's in 1948. Lindwall habitually placed a short leg behind the square leg umpire. When Edrich came in, Bradman asked Lindwall:
'Do you want that short leg behind or in front of the umpire?'
'No, leave him there,' Lindwall said.
He bowled a couple to Edrich and would have had him caught by the short leg if he had taken Bradman's hint. He asked Bradman if he should move the fielder.
'It's too late now,' Bradman said; 'he won't play that shot again.' Edrich played against Australia for another five years; Lindwall says he always had him in trouble as a result of Bradman's tip.
----------------------------
Lindwall recalls that the team attended a black tie function while a match was in progress, and that three of the bowlers on duty, himself, Colin McCool and Ern Toshach, were then invited to a party 15 miles out of London. They had to m ake three separate cab trips to get there;
this persuaded them to stay at the party rather than attempt a complicated trip back in the early hours of the morning. When they did get back, still in dinner suits, they went up the hotel stairs incase
Bradman was in the lift, but met him doing his exercises. The great man said no more than: 'Have a nice night? You had better do all right today.'
They had a shower and took the field. Bradman bowled the three of them
all morning; each took three wickets. Lindwall was on the rubbing table at lunch when Bradman 'smacked me on the behind' and said: 'You were pretty lucky today.'
'Why? We got them all out.'
'If you hadn't I would have liked to see the three of you bowling all afternoon.'
------------------------------------------
Bradman had a horror start as captain. He lost the toss at the 'Gabba,
watched his main strike bowler Ernie McCormick break down and was out
for a duck in the second innings on a sticky wicket. England romped home by 322 runs and won the second Test in Sydney by an innings, rain once again coming to its aid. Bradman made his second successive duck and the critics were not impressed with the scoreboard - England 2, Australia 0 and in grave danger of losing the Ashes. One ewspaper reported that Bradman, the spotlight now focused on him all the time
and his anxiety level full to overflowing, was not getting the loyal support of all his players. McCabe issued a statement saying the players were behind him.
Things turned around for Australia and Bradman in the third Test in Melbourne. With rain a factor for the third time and England batting on a sticky wicket, the shrewd Bradman told his bowlers not to get England out. When Allen declared (too late, as it turned out) towards
the end of play on Saturday, the wicket was still unfriendly. Bradman gambled and opened the second innings with tail-enders Bill O'Reilly and a stunned `Chuck' Fleetwood-Smith.
O�Reilly was out first ball, but Fleetwood-Smith survived, joking that he had the game by the throat.
BY Monday the wicket had lost its fire and, with Bradman back to his fluent best with 270, Australia won. Bradman's improvisation had paid off. This time Allen's captaincy was under fire. He might have clinched the series 3-0 if he had declared England's second innings
sooner and exposed Australia to the damp wicket. Australia won the next two Tests, the captain contributing 212 and 169, to retain the Ashes 3-2 and Bradman had come through his first baptism of fire with his reputation enhanced.
================================================== ==========
In Adelaide against the might of the West Indies Merv Hughes had just completed his highest Test innings of 72 not out, sharing in an 114 run 9th wicket partnership with Dean Jones (216). Hughes was relaxing, towel around his neck, enjoying a cold something and bathing in the kudos of his colleagues for some cavalier, entertaining and ridiculous
batsmanship. Then The Don entered the room. After congratulating Jones on his strokeplay, Bradman cast an eye at the big, sweaty, moustachioed fast bowler, shook his head and said, "It�s a funny game, cricket."
-
================================================== ==
-Michael Parkinson on Don:
There is, for instance, the tale of Bill Black, an off-spin bowler playing for Lithgow, who on a memorable day in 1931 bowled Bradman for 52. The umpire was so excited that when the ball hit Bradman's wicket he called out: "Bill, you've got him."
The ball was mounted and given to Black as proof that he had dismissed
the greatest batsman in the world.
Later that season Don Bradman again played against Black. As the bowler marked out his run, Don said to the wicketkeeper: "What sort of bowler is this fellow?"
The wicketkeeper, a mischief-maker like the rest of his tribe, replied: "Don't you remember this bloke? He bowled you out a few weeks ago and has been boasting about it ever since."
"Is that so?" said Bradman. Two overs later Black pleaded with his skipper to be taken off. Bradman had hit him for 62 runs in two eight-ball overs. He made 100 in three overs and finished with 256,
including 14 sixes and 29 fours.
---------
On Bradman's first tour of England in 1930 there was a popular rumour that the English pitches would sort him out. As an ardent subscriber to this theory, George Macauley, the feisty Yorkshire seam bowler, couldn't wait to get at Bradman.
When Yorkshire played the Australians Macauley demanded loudly of his captain: "Let me have a go at this bugger." His first over was a maiden. Bradman then hit him for five fours in the second over and took 16 from the third. A spectator yelled: "George, tha' should have kept thi' bloody trap shut."
-----------------------------
In Sir Donald's last first-class game at Sydney, Miller greeted him with two bouncers. The first, of the harmless variety, was hit for four. The second, preceded by a gesture to the press box declaring: 'If you think that was funny, you ain't seen nothing yet,' nearly
decapitated Sir Donald, who at the time happened to be chief selector.
================================================
================================================== =======
His personal setbacks:
Sir Donald has had to confront much sadness in his personal life, which perhaps strengthened his resolve to remain a private person. His son, John, born in 1939, three years after the death of the Bradman's infant son, was afflicted by poliomyelitis was a young teenager. He made a full recovery from the virus but continued to suffer because he was the son of Don Bradman.
In 1972 John changed his name by deed poll. At that time Sir Donald said: "Only those who have to live with the incessant strain of publicity can have any idea of its impact".
Daughter Shirley was born with cerebral palsy. Lady Bradman, who had heart bypass surgery several years ago, and her husband have had periods of indifferent and poor health
Bradman on sledging:
"I played under Alan Kippax in New South Wales for some time, I played under Jack Ryder in the Test series in 28-29, I played under Bill Woodfull in 1930 until he retired, and I captained the side until I
retired. And in the whole of that time, I don't recall one single incident of sledging. It never occurred, and it would not have occurred because it would not have been allowed, not one of those
captains would have allowed it. If it had happened under me I would have given the fellow one warni ng, and if it had happened again I would have made sure he was not selected again.... it never went on in my day, not at all, and I don't think it should happen now."
=======================================
Give him 300 and ask him to go out,'' shouted a spectator at the
Australians v Worcestershire match in 1934 during Don Bradman's
innings of 206, the second of the three consecutive double centuries
he made against that County. A lady watching the Don score 452 not out
in 415 minutes for NSW against Queensland on January 30, 1930,
remarked ``Why don't they let someone else have a turn? I am sick of
looking at him.''
That the Don was a nightmare to the bowlers is revealed in a despatch
by Arthur Mailey in 1949. He wrote ``I felt sorry for those bowlers
who were and will be up tomorrow against Bradman. Breaking through his
defence is even more difficult than getting clearance from the
Taxation Department.I've tried both.''
===============================================
Bill O Reilly on Don:
There's never been and never will be in my estimation a batsman so
good as that fella. I don't care how many you like to pour into one -
all the Chappells, the Borders and so on. Forget them, they're just
child's play compared with Bradman, and I've seen them all. Bradman
was a bloke whose ability with the bat was absolutely inconceivable.
The Yanks talk about Babe Ruth and all that. To hell with Babe Ruth.
This boy was a modern miracle.''
================================================== =====
John Bradman, the son on his father :
I recall one night just after I'd gone to bed, I heard this wailing coming from his room and I ran in to find him jumping up and down slapping himself. He'd hopped into bed and had been bitten by a swarm
of bees ... the Department of Agriculture had a special unit that dealt with bees.
"So the next morning he rang them up and said my name is Don Bradman
and I've got some bees in my cavity wall. And as quick as a flash the bloke on the phone said: `Well my name is Bill Smith and I've got bats in the belfry' and hung up. The poor fellow thought it was a joke.''
--
Mr Bradman reiterated his belief that his father should not be so revered that he becomes god-like. "I was in the State Library recently where some of his things are in a collection ... one item is a rug
which used to be on the floor of my room. It's in the design of the Australian blazer pocket and it has a dark green ackground and in this dark green background are some faded patches. "I was standing next to some people and they were discussing these pale patches in hushed tones and with almost reverential significance ... I could have
told them they were the patches where my little dog had peed on it.''
================================================== =
Captaincy stories
'Bradman could read a batsman and tell you how to bowl to him, but he did it obliquely, as with Bill Edrich, who tended to play across the line, at Lord's in 1948. Lindwall habitually placed a short leg behind the square leg umpire. When Edrich came in, Bradman asked Lindwall:
'Do you want that short leg behind or in front of the umpire?'
'No, leave him there,' Lindwall said.
He bowled a couple to Edrich and would have had him caught by the short leg if he had taken Bradman's hint. He asked Bradman if he should move the fielder.
'It's too late now,' Bradman said; 'he won't play that shot again.' Edrich played against Australia for another five years; Lindwall says he always had him in trouble as a result of Bradman's tip.
----------------------------
Lindwall recalls that the team attended a black tie function while a match was in progress, and that three of the bowlers on duty, himself, Colin McCool and Ern Toshach, were then invited to a party 15 miles out of London. They had to m ake three separate cab trips to get there;
this persuaded them to stay at the party rather than attempt a complicated trip back in the early hours of the morning. When they did get back, still in dinner suits, they went up the hotel stairs incase
Bradman was in the lift, but met him doing his exercises. The great man said no more than: 'Have a nice night? You had better do all right today.'
They had a shower and took the field. Bradman bowled the three of them
all morning; each took three wickets. Lindwall was on the rubbing table at lunch when Bradman 'smacked me on the behind' and said: 'You were pretty lucky today.'
'Why? We got them all out.'
'If you hadn't I would have liked to see the three of you bowling all afternoon.'
------------------------------------------
Bradman had a horror start as captain. He lost the toss at the 'Gabba,
watched his main strike bowler Ernie McCormick break down and was out
for a duck in the second innings on a sticky wicket. England romped home by 322 runs and won the second Test in Sydney by an innings, rain once again coming to its aid. Bradman made his second successive duck and the critics were not impressed with the scoreboard - England 2, Australia 0 and in grave danger of losing the Ashes. One ewspaper reported that Bradman, the spotlight now focused on him all the time
and his anxiety level full to overflowing, was not getting the loyal support of all his players. McCabe issued a statement saying the players were behind him.
Things turned around for Australia and Bradman in the third Test in Melbourne. With rain a factor for the third time and England batting on a sticky wicket, the shrewd Bradman told his bowlers not to get England out. When Allen declared (too late, as it turned out) towards
the end of play on Saturday, the wicket was still unfriendly. Bradman gambled and opened the second innings with tail-enders Bill O'Reilly and a stunned `Chuck' Fleetwood-Smith.
O�Reilly was out first ball, but Fleetwood-Smith survived, joking that he had the game by the throat.
BY Monday the wicket had lost its fire and, with Bradman back to his fluent best with 270, Australia won. Bradman's improvisation had paid off. This time Allen's captaincy was under fire. He might have clinched the series 3-0 if he had declared England's second innings
sooner and exposed Australia to the damp wicket. Australia won the next two Tests, the captain contributing 212 and 169, to retain the Ashes 3-2 and Bradman had come through his first baptism of fire with his reputation enhanced.
================================================== ==========
In Adelaide against the might of the West Indies Merv Hughes had just completed his highest Test innings of 72 not out, sharing in an 114 run 9th wicket partnership with Dean Jones (216). Hughes was relaxing, towel around his neck, enjoying a cold something and bathing in the kudos of his colleagues for some cavalier, entertaining and ridiculous
batsmanship. Then The Don entered the room. After congratulating Jones on his strokeplay, Bradman cast an eye at the big, sweaty, moustachioed fast bowler, shook his head and said, "It�s a funny game, cricket."
-
================================================== ==
-Michael Parkinson on Don:
There is, for instance, the tale of Bill Black, an off-spin bowler playing for Lithgow, who on a memorable day in 1931 bowled Bradman for 52. The umpire was so excited that when the ball hit Bradman's wicket he called out: "Bill, you've got him."
The ball was mounted and given to Black as proof that he had dismissed
the greatest batsman in the world.
Later that season Don Bradman again played against Black. As the bowler marked out his run, Don said to the wicketkeeper: "What sort of bowler is this fellow?"
The wicketkeeper, a mischief-maker like the rest of his tribe, replied: "Don't you remember this bloke? He bowled you out a few weeks ago and has been boasting about it ever since."
"Is that so?" said Bradman. Two overs later Black pleaded with his skipper to be taken off. Bradman had hit him for 62 runs in two eight-ball overs. He made 100 in three overs and finished with 256,
including 14 sixes and 29 fours.
---------
On Bradman's first tour of England in 1930 there was a popular rumour that the English pitches would sort him out. As an ardent subscriber to this theory, George Macauley, the feisty Yorkshire seam bowler, couldn't wait to get at Bradman.
When Yorkshire played the Australians Macauley demanded loudly of his captain: "Let me have a go at this bugger." His first over was a maiden. Bradman then hit him for five fours in the second over and took 16 from the third. A spectator yelled: "George, tha' should have kept thi' bloody trap shut."
-----------------------------
In Sir Donald's last first-class game at Sydney, Miller greeted him with two bouncers. The first, of the harmless variety, was hit for four. The second, preceded by a gesture to the press box declaring: 'If you think that was funny, you ain't seen nothing yet,' nearly
decapitated Sir Donald, who at the time happened to be chief selector.
================================================
================================================== =======
His personal setbacks:
Sir Donald has had to confront much sadness in his personal life, which perhaps strengthened his resolve to remain a private person. His son, John, born in 1939, three years after the death of the Bradman's infant son, was afflicted by poliomyelitis was a young teenager. He made a full recovery from the virus but continued to suffer because he was the son of Don Bradman.
In 1972 John changed his name by deed poll. At that time Sir Donald said: "Only those who have to live with the incessant strain of publicity can have any idea of its impact".
Daughter Shirley was born with cerebral palsy. Lady Bradman, who had heart bypass surgery several years ago, and her husband have had periods of indifferent and poor health
