THE LAFRANCHI MEDALS - Mt Prospect 1898
Blampied farmer Mick Cleary's cousins back home in County Limerick were well versed in anti-imperialist rhetoric by the time Mick was kicking a football with the local team. First cousin Donncadh OhAnnigan would soon be taking the fight to the British Army. As Commander in Chief of the East Limerick Flying column OhAnnigan struck fear in the Black and Tans and their allies throughout 1920/21. At Dromkeen in February 1921 he ordered the execution of two RIC men captured in an ambush that left 11 of the ‘British’ enemy dead. The closest Mick Cleary came to war with the British Army was knocking a pro-conscriptionist off his feet on the bridge outside the Cleary home in Mt Prospect.
Mick and the local Irish Catholics were ardently anti-war. War however was a long way off when the Creswick Advertiser of Wednesday 21 September 1898 reported how some 50 people had attended a premiership night at the Swiss Mountain. With Mr T Fletcher in the chair ‘a good supper was tastefully laid out by Mrs Lafranchi’. Jos Hutchins, C Pedrotti, and Mr Hammerton did the singing and a proud Mr A Lafranchi responded 'on behalf of his mother'.
The Mount Prospect team - left half of the photo - Mick 'Punga' Cleary - arrowed.
The Mount Prospect team (right half of the photo).
Andrea Lafranchi, a prominent Swiss-Italian immigrant had died in mid 1897, not long after promising the boys he'd give them individual silver medals if they won the premiership. They didn’t lose a match in 1898, and so, the medals were presented posthumously. Swiss Italian immigrants – Olympian Steve Moneghetti and football legend Ron Barassi share this heritage - were prolific in the area.
Names such as Righetti, Gervasoni, Caligari, Pedrotti, and Morganti can be found in the local Catholic cemetery at Eganstown. It really was a multi-cultural community and this must surely have been the first football club sponsored by a European immigrant. Mr J T Yates concluded the night with a toast to the players, noting that they'd ‘won every game and had only two goals kicked against them'. Eventually, Margherita Lafranchi, widow and mother, bade the guests good night and hoped her late husband was happy in heaven.
Where are the medals, I wonder? Some years ago I held one of the Lafranchi medals in the palm of my hand. It was a finely crafted, oval shaped medal. As I recall the medal carried no inscription identifying the recipient. I’d love to hear from anyone who still has one of those medals.
(RIGHT) Mick 'Punga' Cleary, born in 1871 to John and Johanna Cleary of Mt Prospect. The first born, he was named after his grandfather, Michael Cleary, of Anglesboro, County Limerick. Is the word Punga aboriginal for sun? Or is it Maori for anchor.
