Fooling Around in Flannels: Cricket on the Limestone Plains: The extraordinary McDougall Cup
THE McDOUGAL CUP
This cricket trophy would have to be one of the most unusual in the ACT. The cup is well described by Clem Hamilton. He was born on the 12 October 1927 and his father was Archie Hamilton who was senior fireman at the Fire Brigade from 1926 until he died in 1944. Until 1939 the Fire Brigade was located at the Transport Depot, now the Old Bust Depot Markets in Kingston. In 1939 the Brigade moved to its new fire station in Forrest, the location today of the Fire Brigade Museum.
'Now alongside the sheds there was what they called the rec. hut, ...... Alongside the rec. hut there was a cricket pitch and there used to be cricket games between the fire brigade, the Police, the power house or whoever and they all played for a trophy called the McDougal cup which was just an old chamber pot that someone had done up, put some handles on and a bit of wire on the top to make it look posh and they used to play for that on Sundays.
There were many, many happy days down there playing for the old McDougal cup. I have often wondered about the old McDougal cup, it was named after 'When McDougal topped the score" an old poem by Henry Lawson [sic. It was by T.E. Spencer – see below] and I often wonder where the old McDougal cup is now probably several metres under the earth in one of the old dumps it would be nice to see the old thing again.'
Well, the cup is still with us and is part of the Canberra Fire Museum collection at Forrest, ACT.
The cup was made and donated by the Plumbers' Shop. Undated shields on the base indicate the successful challengers:
Firemen's Sports Club x 2
Electrical Department
Plumbers' Shop
Transport Section
Parks and Gardens Section
Don Selth, in Cricket on the Limestone Plains, wrote:
'One of the trophies that was often, but incorrectly, assumed to be an FCTCA trophy in the 1930s was the McDougall Cup. It was one of the trophies awarded to winners of "challenge" matches, and was held by the winner until another team challenged and defeated the holder. The McDougall Cup commemorated the hero of a ballad by T.E. Spencer, who wrote of a match between Molonglo ['Molongo' in the poem] and Piper's Flat in which McDougall, batting no. 11, went to the wicket with 50 to win. McDougall ran 50 when his dog ran off with the ball before the fieldsmen could retrieve it. The ballad concluded:
And the critics say they never saw a cricket match like that
When McDougal broke the record in the game at Pipers Flat
And the folk are jubilating as they never did before
For we played Molongo cricket and McDougal topped the score!
The adoption of the hero of the poem's name seemed appropriate in many ways, including the fact that the cricket pitch was beside the Molonglo River (now dammed to create Lake Burley Griffin).
Selth writes that the cup was first awarded in 1926. On the outbreak of the Second World War it was held by the Fire Brigade but was not contested again until January 1964 when the Burns Club unsuccessfully challenged.
The full text of T.E. Spencer's comic poem 'How McDougal topped the Score' is in the attached file.
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