Arthur Beetson

Arthur ‘Artie’ Beetson OAM (1945–2011), rugby league legend, was the first Indigenous Australian to captain a major national sporting team and is counted among the game’s best ever forwards. Beetson’s mother was a member of the Stolen Generations and had grown up on the Cherbourg Mission before moving to Buderim and then Roma, where Beetson was born. He started playing rugby league at age six, left school at sixteen and at nineteen moved to Brisbane to play first grade for Redcliffe. In 1965, when Redcliffe won the Brisbane premiership, he was named the club’s player of the year and was soon afterwards signed to play for Balmain in the Sydney competition. He earned Kangaroos selection for the first time in 1966, and went on to captain Australia against France in 1973, against Great Britain in 1974, and for the Kangaroos’ successful World Series campaign of 1975. Meanwhile, having left Balmain, he led Eastern Suburbs to the premierships of 1974 and 1975. He was the NSW Rugby League player of the year in 1976, and the Rugby League Week player of the year for 1974. He joined the Parramatta Eels in 1979 and in 1980 captained Queensland to victory in the inaugural State or Origin series. Returning to Brisbane, he became captain-coach at Redcliffe and was also appointed coach of the Queensland state team, who won the State of Origin three years straight from 1982 and again in 1989. Beetson served a short stint as coach of the Kangaroos in 1983, and in the 1980s and 1990s he coached Eastern Suburbs and the Cronulla Sharks while also serving as a selector and recruitment officer. He was inducted into the Sport Australia Hall of Fame in 1989. A 1992 poll rated him at sixteen in the game’s top 100 players; the NRL named him an Immortal in 2003; and in 2008, he was named in the Australian and the Queensland Team of the Century. In all, he notched up 438 first class rugby league fixtures at club, state and international level, despite his playing career being marred at times by injury, fluctuating weight and fitness, and disciplinary issues. In 2010 the ARTIE Academy (Achieving Results Through Indigenous Education) was founded in Beetson’s honour; and following his passing in December 2011 his sons established the Arthur Beetson Foundation which, among other initiatives, secures scholarships for Indigenous students to leading Brisbane schools. The teams in the annual Indigenous All Stars rugby league match compete for the Arthur Beetson Trophy.

Purchased 2019
© Michael McQuillan's Classic Photographs