Deniliquin have had a lot of Football clubs over time from junior football to senior football.

This story will be updated over time as more records are looked at and added to the narrative.

Teams

Deniliquin Rams (named Rams after name search in 1984)
Deniliquin Rovers (first mentioned in 1903 before 1977 start?)
Deniliquin Colts (known as Red and Whites)
Railway Football Club (stopped briefly in 1915 and known as Magpies)
Deniliquin Federals (Wore Green & White)
North Deniliquin
Central
West Deniliquin
East End (Wore Maroon c1919)
Commonwealth Football Club (c1901-02, worn Red, White and Blue)
South Deniliquin (1931, Maroon jumpers, Blue knickers(shorts)

Local Grand Final clashes

Colts defeated East End in 1925
Colts defeated East End in 1926
Colts defeated East in 1927
West Deniliquin defeated North Deniliquin in 1953
Railway defeated Federals 1914
Federals defeated Railway 1915
Federals defeated Railway 1919 – 5.7 – 37 to 2.8 – 20
East beat West in 1934 (Deniliquin Junior Football)
North defeated East 1935 (Deniliquin Junior Football

Leagues

Murray Football League
Echuca League
Edwards River League
Edward River Junior Football League
Picola & District Football League
Deniliquin District Football Association
Deniliquin Football Association

Did You Know?

The Federals, East End and Mathoura were in a league by themselves?

In May 1928, a junior team was said to ‘most probably go under the name of the Deniliquin Rovers’.

The Rams were known simply as Deniliquin Football Club and a picture of the club logo in the 1950’s had a Magpie in it.

Commonwealth Football Club had a party until 2:30am at the Masonic Hall.

The Independent reported there was a club called the Deniliquin Rovers in 1903.

St Kilda played against Deniliquin in October 1933 and the Saints won the match 11.11 – 77 to 7.5 – 47 and the game was played in Deniliquin.

St Kilda finished 9th out of 12 teams in the 1933 VFL season whilst Deniliquin were Echuca League Premiers.

Deniliquin were the 1933 Echuca League Premiers in their debut season in the competition and were attacked at Mathoura station by egg throwers, one player was face slapped while receiving a handshake from that person.

Deniliquin went back to back in 1934 by defeating Echuca East 14.10 – 94 to 10.14  – 74.

Deniliquin quit the Echuca League for a brief period of time in 1937.

Deniliquin Football Club put in an application to join the Campaspe Valley Football League in 1946 and had a meeting at Lyceum Hall.

Deniliquin Football Club did not move to the Campaspe Valley Football League and stayed in the Echuca Football League in 1946.

A fight caused the abandonment of a match between East End and Mathoura as a fight broke out in the second quarter, East End were leading 3.4 – 22 to 2.3 – 15.

Since finding out about the Lyceum Theatre, we couldn’t stop thinking about it and so we started looking for any detail we could find.

Trove had lots of scanned articles mentioning the Lyceum mostly news about the Regent being established at Town Hall in 1937 and a couple of ads promoting movies and even a story of a dance held by the Basketball Association in 1928 presenting a shield called the Allison Shield to the winning Roman Catholic team.

The Lyceum Theatre was reportedly established in 1910 but there are two pictures dated 1905 with a sign saying Lyceum Pictures and reports that the building was previously named Temperance Hall pre-1910.

Mr Samuel MacGavin was the man responsible for founding the Lyceum and he ran it until ill health caused him to put his family in charge before dying in March 1918.

It was not uncommon to read Lyceum Pictureland, Lyceum Pictures, Lyceum Theatre and Lyceum Hall in the newspapers of the time.

From what we’ve read on the report and what we’ve seen on Trove, the theatre was a place with the lot as locals and visitors could partake in Dances, watching Movies and doing some Skating on a weekly basis there was even at least one instance of Boxing and Wrestling.

The theatre received an update in 1927 with new chairs and interior installed in a bid to become the picture palace of town.

The Lyceum can be seen in this late 1930’s picture at Deniliquin History in Photos, for locals it is in the same spot as the Regent but for general readers who don’t know where the Regent is, it is the building right behind the tree just a little off centre.

A past owner of the Theatre was the Probert family, the family was well known for owning the Globe Hotel for many years.

In December 1937, Riverina Amusements Ltd went into liquidation ending the screening of movies at Lyceum Theatre.

In 1941, 2QN was brought from Deniliquin Broadcasting Company by the Regent Broadcasting Company and the 2QN studio was moved from the School of Arts to Lyceum Hall.

So after finding out all of the above, We put in ‘Lyceum Theatre Deniliquin’ in Google to learn its ultimate fate and the third result was Ennor Engineering and in their history they tell the story of buying the Lyceum Theatre in 1953 and instead of demolishing it, they dismantled it and moved it north to 133 Davidson Street.

Ennor Engineering’s history detailed report has given us great details for example the building was auctioned in June 1953 and was rebuilt by Hardman Bros. in December that year, the report also has the dimensions of the Lyceum (’40 x ‘110) and reported that the frame was made of Oregon which we believe is also known as Douglas fir.

The report goes on to discuss the changes to the building from the shortening of the columns (building height) to having a new brick frontage and changing windows plus more but it is the best report on the Lyceum and we are grateful that Ennor Engineering kept great records.

Dot Murphy uploaded a picture in 2012 to Deniliquin History in Photos of the Theatre and below it we have a picture of the Ennor Engineering building so you get an idea of the past and present.

We want to thank Deniliquin History in Photos for inspiring us to find out more about local history, they have probably given us a very expensive hobby but it sure is a lot of fun.