Please note that much of the history of the Brighton Football Club has been lost because the records were lost in a fire.  Below is a very brief history written by Graham Cummings and some other information on BFC from other sources.

 

A VERY BRIEF HISTORY OF BRIGHTON FOOTBALL CLUB

By Graham Cummings (Life Member, BDOS Football Club).

Graham played for both BHOS and Brighton Football Clubs in the 1980s and has coached at the Brighton Bombers.

 

The Brighton Football Club is one of the oldest in South Australia. Games were originally played in a paddock opposite its current location (Preston Ave) in the 1890s between North and South Brighton Lads. This was before joining the Sturt Association and games were played east of the current Brighton Hotel.

 

Some key dates are:

• In 1918 Brighton joined the Mid Southern Association

• In the 1920s Brighton moved to its current location at Brighton Oval.

• In 1936 Brighton won the Centenary Cup Premiership defeating arch rival Blackwood

• Post WW2 saw many epic struggles vs Sturt (now Marion), Blackwood and Plympton.  

• Dramatic growth of the club occurred in the 1950s when Brighton joined the South Australian Amateur Football League (SAAFL).

  • Here we saw the influx of many top players including: Neil Hawke (Test Cricketer), Des Staite (3 generations of Staites have played at Brighton with distinction), Harry Kernahan, Brian Colbey (All Australian) and Ray Button. The last quartet subsequently played for Glenelg with distinction.

• In the 1960s an ambitious proposal was to build social clubrooms worth $40,000, which would be financed with Brighton Cricket Club.  The man who spearheaded this was local lawyer Lance Lee.  The current committee room is named in his honour. The Brighton Sports and Social club was formed to run the Club’s venue and as avenue of fund raising the BSSC issued foundation building membership of $40 for 10 years membership. These people who initially joined are listed in the clubs foyer.  The club building was completed in 1969 and has had an extension added in the late 1980s.

• The year 2020 marks 100 years of footy at Brighton Oval.

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OTHER INFORMATION

According to the book, “A History of the South Australian Amateur Football League 1911-1994”, the Brighton Football Club has had the following history.

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