Almanac Cricket: Exhibition – Sunraysia’s Pioneering Cricket Association

 

Heather Lee is an art historian, curator, researcher, writer and artist with an ingrained interest in cricket.  Despite the Anglo, Australian and Indian genetic makeup she claims no cricketing ability. Heather will also be one of our daily Ashes match reporter during the series.

 

Sunraysia’s Pioneering Cricket Association

 

It could be argued that the bowling of the first ball on the first day of the first match of the 2025/26 Men’s Ashes series is the most anticipated sporting moment of the year. The media machine has been doing great work generating hype, and rightly so.

 

However, ninety years ago a pioneering cricket competition in the far north-west Victoria, received no such fanfare. In fact, the early rounds of the competition’s matches went unreported in the local press until ‘Keeper’ rectified the oversight by penning a paragraph which appeared on page 5 of the Sunraysia Daily on December 13, 1935:

 

In the review of sporting activities for the year in yesterday’s Christmas supplement issue no mention was made of the formation of ladies’ cricket teams…[at Red Cliffs].

 

The ladies teams in question were ‘South-East’ (later named ‘Stewart’), a church youth team ‘CYMS’, and a side called simply ‘304’ likely named for allocation number of the soldier settler fruit block where the players worked. In 1935, the teams came together to inaugurate the Red Cliffs & District Ladies Cricket Association (RC&DLA).

 

 

 A digital collage of some of the Sunraysia Daily newspaper reports from 1935-40 relating to the Red Cliffs & District Ladies Cricket Association. Source: Trove

 

Across subsequent seasons the momentum of the RC&DLA grew in line with nationwide trends. Locally, teams comprised of women employed in the local fruit packing facilities joined the Association while sides representing the YWCA and nearby Nichols Point also came on board. It was a vibrant and well patronised Association involving more than a hundred individual players during the five seasons it was active. When World War Two became a reality for all Australians, the decision was made to temporarily disband the RC&DLA at the end of the 1939-40 season, but after the war, did not reform.

 

Reunions of former RC&DLA players were held in 1991 and 2001, the latter organised by Mrs Ikey Waddington, Dulcie Waugh, Eileen Strachan and Elsie Forrest whose son John Forrest MHR was the local Federal Member.

 

 

 Workspace3496+Gallery in Red Cliffs, Victoria, is currently hosting an exhibition dedicated to the Red Cliffs & District Ladies Cricket Association.

 

Despite the women’s enthusiasm to celebrate their cricketing achievements in their lifetimes, the story of Red Cliffs’ ladies cricket association faded with the players’ passing. Fortunately, an exhibition currently on display at Workspace3496+Gallery, Red Cliffs, until November 29^th, revives the narrative and reflects upon the Association’s significance to the region.

 

Titled Prowess | the Red Cliffs & District Ladies Cricket Association 1935-40, the exhibition consists of contemporary print-based works on paper and objects which take inspiration from archival newspaper reports and the few items in the collection of the Red Cliffs & District Historical Society.

 

 

 A couple of visitors to the exhibition intrigued with the works on paper.

 

Around the gallery walls hang eight large format images. Each brings together the shape and textural timber-grained qualities of a cricket bat with an image of a vintage sandwich plate in the style of those taken along to a match bearing an offering for afternoon tea. Team names are reflected in the titles of works.

 

 

 

 In-situ images of the exhibition’s central installation which incorporates eight cricket bats.

 

Meanwhile, in the centre of the gallery sits a trestle table topped by bespoke a paper table-runner. Overhung the  at one end the runner is printed in metallic gold ink with an impression of the medallion issued to players who attended one of the reunion events. Lined up along the length of the table are the back halves of eight cricket bats, the cut surface handprinted with the plate images.

 

A crucial element of this exhibition is inclusion of a list of players names extracted from the newspaper archives. From this list it is hoped conversations will be sparked which bring to light information to help build a more complete picture of the RC&DLA and the individuals who took part in Sunraysia’s first organised women’s cricket competition.

 

Heather Lee

 

 

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