THE late Jim Newton’s Bahgallah Football Club blazer has a rich history and thanks to his family, that history will be preserved, to be shared by the community for years to come.

The blazer dates back more than 60 years, to when smaller communities from Dergholm to Wando Vale had their own football, netball and cricket clubs to get behind.

The Bahgallah Memorial Hall committee has accepted the blazer to join its collection of local keepsakes as it prepares to celebrate its centenary on 11 November this year.

Committee secretary, Kaye Annett said the blazer was a welcome piece of memorabilia at the hall.

“The Bahgallah hall committee is very appreciative of this donation and we will definitely by looking after it,” she said.

The maroon and gold blazer’s longevity and character are evident in every little marking and it’s meaning to Jim was also clear – his wife, Pat said he had refused to let it leave his possession.

‘It just hung and hung in the wardrobe and I said, ‘You don’t wear that anymore – what are you going to do?’,” she said.

“(His response was) ‘Leave it alone, it stays there’.

“Jim just loved it.”

Following his passing on 6 June this year, at the age of 83, Pat said his family was pleased to donate the blazer to the hall.

“He would have been so proud to know that’s where it ended up,” she said.

Pat also spoke of Jim’s love for Bahgallah, its long-retired school and sporting clubs that live on only in the history books and memories of those who made them great.

“He always talked about Bahgallah,” she said.

“(He would) take me for drives … ended up somewhere around all those places.

“Probably only two months before he went into care, we went for a drive around Bahgallah and had to stop where he went to school and read the plaque.”

Jim grew up and attended school in Bahgallah and played his football for the local club in the late 1950s.

The time was of tight-knit communities across the region and many more local events such as the hall dances on the Saturdays of home football games, at which many young adults met their eventual partners.

Jim and Pat met at one such event in Dergholm, going on to marry in 1958 and have four children over the next 15 years.

They also had nine grandchildren and 10 great-grandchildren.

Ms Annett said while much of what was enjoyed by smaller communities such as Bahgallah is long gone – its school and sporting clubs retired for decades – the memories of people who experienced them mean they’ve never lost their glow.

“All these years later, people still recount their time at Bahgallah,” she said.

“We had a reunion at Bahgallah of all the old sporting teams at one stage – everyone turned up wearing their blazers and their old jumpers and their cricket hats.

“There were three generations of people who hadn’t necessarily played together but they all came back for the occasion.”

In accepting Jim’s blazer, Ms Annett said it was a good opportunity for others to consider donating any Bahgallah-related keepsakes to the hall.

“You get to a stage where the next generation is not going to want to keep it (but) they don’t want anything horrible to happen to it,” she said.

“Anything from that era is going to be memorabilia.”

Football and cricket uniforms and photos of those who played for the clubs are welcome.

The hall was originally built in 1922 as a memorial honouring locals who served in the First World War.

The first public meeting of the committee was on 11 March, that year, with the intent to build a hall, which would be opened exactly eight months later on 11 November on Armistice Day, now commemorated as Remembrance Day.

As part of the upcoming centenary celebrations, an honour board recognising Second World War veterans will be added to existing memorials for the community’s service men and women and the morning of the event will be dedicated to those who served.

Ms Annett said the afternoon of the day would provide an opportunity for Bahgallah community members – past and present – to share their stories of growing up in the area.

“It’ll just be a day of reminiscing and fun and laughter,” she said.