Haydn Bunton’s family overjoyed by discovery of long-forgotten 1937 radio interview

Haydn Bunton is one of the game’s greats. It was thought there were no existing recordings of his voice but a chance 85-year-old discovery has given new insight into a champion. WATCH

The family of Australian football Legend Haydn Bunton has heard his voice for the first time in almost 70 years after the chance discovery of a rare radio interview conducted at the 1937 state carnival in Perth.

Described as having “the grace of a ballet dancer and the film-star looks”, Bunton was one of the game’s greatest players, with the Fitzroy champion acclaimed as the first player to win three Brownlow Medals.

LISTEN TO THE HISTORIC AUDIO IN THE PLAYER ABOVE

Given he died at 44 from injuries sustained in a car accident in 1955 – the year before television arrived in Australia – it was believed there were no known recordings of his voice.

But a clean-up of previously donated items at AFL House in Docklands last year uncovered a box which included old scrapbooks and two single-sided lacquer discs marked ‘6PR Football Carnival, Haydn Bunton’.

The AFL’s Patrick Keane sought the National Film and Sound Archive of Australia’s expertise to see if the discs were repairable.

After some extensive restoration work, they were found to contain almost six minutes of a live interview Bunton did on Perth radio station 6PR on Saturday, August 14, 1937 – the day he captained Victoria to an Australian National Football Carnival win over Western Australia at Subiaco.

New audio of triple-Brownlow medallist Haydn Bunton Snr has emerged.

Now, almost 85 years to the day of the recording, Bunton’s sons – Haydn Jr. (himself an Australian Football Hall of Fame member) and David – have been able to listen to their father’s assessment of the match and his vision for the game as a national sport.

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It was the first time they had heard his voice since his untimely passing in 1955.

David Bunton, who lives at Southport, and Haydn, who lives in Perth, could barely believe the audio of their famous father had been unearthed after so many decades

David said it was a “fantastic” discovery not just for the football public who know of Bunton’s numerous football deeds that included three Sandover Medals with Subiaco in the WAFL, but also a treat for the family.

Screen grabs from the Haydn Bunton video ‘How to play Australian Rules Football’.

“It was just wonderful to hear him again because he wasn’t just a footballer to me; he was my dad,” David Bunton said.

“It was such a different style of football to today.”

The NFSA was able to marry up the Bunton audio with some rare footage of him, which they released for the first time on Friday morning.

The NFSA’s Senior Curatorial Officer Simon Smith credited the AFL for their commitment to the history of the game by seeking to have the audio restored and released.

“They are among the oldest live broadcast radio recordings that we have in our collection of any radio stations in Australia,” Smith said.

“I was super keen to see what the family thought of them. I asked them if there were any (voice) recordings of their father and as far as we are concerned, we had nothing.”

Bunton was a teacher of the game.

Bunton was the captain of the Victorian side that defeated Western Australia by eight points in the 1937 carnival final, before 40,000 fans.

In the interview, Bunton told 6PR listeners: “Here we are at the end of the football carnival and what an interesting tussle between Western Australia and Victoria today for the honours of the Australian game of football.”

CLICK HERE TO LISTEN TO THE FULL BUNTON INTERVIEW

“They (Western Australia) fought the game out well. It had me thinking if we would win the game and go back with ‘the Ashes’ or not. Nevertheless, we did, and I feel proud to think that I led the Victorian team to victory.”

The Haydn Bunton Sr statue being transported from the Footscray foundry to the MCG for its official unveiling.

He was amazed by the fact that the crowd was so large that the fence was broken, which meant some fans sat around the boundary line.

“How they got that number into the game I do not know,” he said.

“It was quite amusing to see the fences being broken in and to think that all those people who came into the arena were sitting on the white line. It was something in football that I had never seen before.”

Bunton Sr. played 119 games for Fitzroy in the VFL from 1931-37 and 1942, 72 games with Subiaco in the WAFL from 1938-41, and 17 games with Port Adelaide in 1945.

He was posthumously selected in the VFL-AFL Team of the Century and was one of the inaugural Legends in the Australian Football Hall of Fame in 1996.