Fabulous Forwards exhibition at the State Library with Ali Carle in the Adelaide City region of South Australia

For many South Australian football followers, images from the 1997 Grand Final are burnt into their memory. They record a moment in time when SA again stamped itself as one of the premier football States in the country.

And in 2004, South Australia's pre-eminent position in Australian Rules Football was again on show for all to see on that last Saturday in September when Port Power won the Premiership Flag.

Throughout the decades the Croweaters have supplied their share of fabulous forwards.

In the Jervois Room at the State Library, the North Adelaide faithful have paid homage to their great forwards. Many, like the late great Ken Farmer, are well known to all football lovers. His scrapbook is a treasure trove of football history and his record speaks for itself - having once kicked 23 goals in a game.

“He was the first player in South Australia to kick a hundred goals,” explained Darren Jarman. “That was in 1930, his second season and from then on he scored a hundred goals in eleven seasons in a row.”

Every club has its heroes who the ardent supporters claim to have been the best and so it is with the Roosters. From Magarey Medallists, Ron Phillips in the 40s and 50s to Don Lindner in the 50s and 60s.

The exhibition contains memorabilia from all the greats and a few highlight packages from some very BIG forwards. They include cult figures like Dennis Sachse and colourful characters like Grenville Deitrich.

Many of these blokes performed at State level in the run up to the creation of the AFL but by the nineties, one in particular was given the chance to strut his stuff on the national stage. And he did it with two cameo pieces in the Crows stunning back to back Premiership wins.

“To go back to back was something special. Doing the motor parades and all that in the city and getting over a hundred thousand people in the city. It felt like being the Beatles.”

The North Adelaide Football Club's Fabulous Forwards exhibition is on at the Jervois Room at the State Library until June the 10th, 2005. Entry is free.

Fabulous Forwards exhibition
Jervois Room Mortlock Library
State Library of SA Exhibition ends June 10, 2005