When the 2025 Aussies kick off on the Gold Coast this year, it will be 64 years since Maroochydore SLSC undertook an extraordinary trip to South Australia which had an historic outcome.
By way of background – after its establishment in Royal Life Saving on 01 January 1916, ‘Maroochydore Life Saving and Swimming Club’ took just 3 months before the Club took part in its first lifesaving and swimming competition in Brisbane, where the team came third.
After dominating ‘Royal’ surf competitions for the entire 1920s, Maroochydore joined Surf Life Saving in 1931 and attended its first Aussies in 1933, where Jack Petersen won Silver in the Open Belt at Bondi. He backed that up with a second Silver in 1934. Harold Swanson won an Open Beach Flags Silver in 1952 at North Wollongong. John Rigby won our first ‘Gold’ at the Mooloolaba Aussies of 1959, but it was in the Junior non-Championship Surf Race.
The Maroochydore Team that trooped off to Moana consisted of about 25 athletes – Open and Junior Surf Boats, swept by Graham Ashton, a couple of ski paddlers, a Junior R&R Team, four Open Surf Team swimmers led by 1960 Rome Olympian John Rigby, and a Junior Surf Team of four talented swimmers. Maroochydore had won three State Championships in swim events and travelled to the Aussies in Moana with high hopes of success.
In the months leading up to Moana, Club President Doug Webster chartered a wartime DC-3 aircraft for £1,043/1/9, or $2,086.19. There were 23 seats for 20 athletes and officials (a few went by road), so Doug raffled the three remaining seats at £1 a ticket. For each seat there were 35 tickets sold, with a gross take of £105. Genius. The non-athlete Club members who won each of the three raffles and flew to the 1961 Aussies on the ‘Goony Bird’ were Lin Lunn, John Butt and John Pearce.
Now, there was a problem – Junior Surf Teams swimmer Barrie ‘Darby’ Munro was a Churchie boy and his school in Brisbane were the reigning GPS Swimming Champions. The GPS swim meet was on Saturday afternoon at the old Valley Pool. The Aussies’ 17 (yes, 17!) events were on Sunday in South Australia! The only solution was a fast car from the Valley Pool to Eagle Farm Airport and an all-night flight to Adelaide. Munro won the Open Butterfly and anchored the ‘Churchie’ Open Relay Team to victory, got third in the Open 400 freestyle and ‘Churchie’ won the GPS swim Championship for the umpteenth time.
The Goony Bird refuelled in Wagga Wagga NSW in the middle of the night and flew on to Adelaide, landing at around midnight on the Sunday, where the team was met by Graham Ashton and Doug Williams, who had towed down the Surf Boat. So onto the waiting bus, and asleep in the Adelaide hotel by the early hours of Sunday…..
The entire Aussies inter-club competition took just one day on the Sunday at Moana Beach. The carnival start time in those days was probably a bit later than the traditional 8am start, but even so there was an hour bus trip from the team hotel to the venue down the Coast from Adelaide.
Pictured – 1961 Australian Surf Lifesaving Championships Grand Parade, Moana Beach South Australia
Early in the programme were the Junior and Open Surf Teams Championships of Australia. Our Juniors were the Queensland Champions and included the State Junior Belt Champion, John Bennett. How is this for a finish – Bennett, Munro and Peter Rigby placed 3rd, 4th and 5th with John Fingleton 8th. A total of just 20 points easily won for Maroochydore its first Australian Championship.
In those 64 years since March 1961, the athletes of Maroochydore have won over 220 Championships, behind only Northcliffe and Manly NSW.
Maroochydore’s Open Surf Teams, with the Olympian in it, looked pretty strong in the flat conditions; but John Rigby wanted to be rested for the Open Surf Race, so Doug Webster made the decision to substitute his worst-performing Junior from the earlier race as the fourth swimmer in the Open team.
Well, what a revelation: the Junior Fingleton came in 3rd in the Open Teams, winning Bronze overall. Webster resolved from that moment on to swim up his Juniors on merit, with the result that three Juniors, with John Rigby, won the Junior-Senior Teams double in 1962 and almost did it again in 1963.
So John Rigby ran third in the Open Surf and had to wait until 1962 to become Maroochydore’s first Open Surf Champion; and the whole Maroochydore team of 1961 scored 1 Gold, 3 Bronze and 4 fourth placings that day – and a permanent place for Maroochydore in Australian and World Surf Sports history.
1961 Junior R&R – (L-R) John Fingleton, Neil McShane, John Knott, Peter Rigby (patient), Barrie Munro – 4th in the Australian Final at Moana.
Camping at Moana Beach 1961 – (L-R) Phil Ryan, ‘Tommy’ Godfrey, John ‘Gozzer’ Goldsbrough and Stan Wilcox. 25 years later, the Maroochydore SLSC Team camped at Moana Beach in 1986.
Now, there’s ANOTHER problem – I can speak from personal experience that the GPS schools did not like Surf Life Saving because of its tendency to disrupt the GPS swimming season. The only way that ‘Darby’ Munro could be released for South Australia was on strict condition that he was at school at ‘Churchie’ on the Monday morning, bright-eyed and bushy-tailed……
…..so, it was back to the ‘Goony Bird’ at Adelaide Airport in a massive traffic jam; on the plane, flying all night and landing in Brisbane in the early hours of Monday morning, just to please the Headmaster at ‘Churchie’.
Just for the record: Doug Webster, John and Peter Rigby are proud Life Members of our Club; John Fingleton, not long before he died, donated his 1961 Gold Medal to the Club for its Centenary; and ‘Darby’ Munro went on to represent Queensland in Surf Life Saving, Swimming, Rugby Union, Water Polo and Athletics.
Contributors for this story were: Life Members – Peter Rigby, John Goldsbrough and 1961 President, Doug Webster.
And that is the story of how we won our very first Australian Surf Life Saving Championship, over 60 years ago.