Football
26 November, 2024
The Bombers and the battles: Ian Anderson's journey
This is not just a story about a footballer but also about a good hay carter and a Vietnam Veteran who has conquered demons.
Ian Gregory Anderson, known to his friends as 'Ginger/Blue/Ando/Champee', was born in Horsham on October 14, 1948.
He grew up on a farm just north of Harrow and attended Wombelano State School, which had 15 students and a teacher, before moving to Edenhope High School, where he became a prefect.
In 1964, Anderson, then 15, played in a premiership with the Douglas Miga Lake Rovers in the Central Wimmera League. Kevin Dellar coached him.
At 16, the Essendon Football Club brought him to Melbourne to play football with them, and he attended year 12 at Essendon High School. After high school, he attended the Melbourne Institute of Technology and did a wool classing course.
The late Reg Burgess from Apsley, who played 124 games for Essendon, won an All-Australian and was named in the Essendon team of the century, alerted a recruiter to a young farm boy ruckman in Miga Lake. Kevin Dellar, who had played five games for Essendon, also significantly influenced Anderson's selection.
The Carlton Football Club saw Ian first, but he wanted to go to Essendon, and so he did.
He debuted for Essendon's senior team in 1967, kicking two goals in his first game and earning two Brownlow votes in his second. Unfortunately, he lost his mother that day.
He played 14 games and scored 21 goals that season. In 1968, despite injuries, he kicked a career-best seven goals in round one and was part of the Reserves premiership team.
Ian recalled his first taste of city life at a pedestrian crossing.
"I hadn't been in a building lift or elevator before and didn't know what the buttons were for. I found the traffic pedestrian lights confusing," he recalled.
"When the red light came up and indicated, 'Don't walk', I thought I had to run, so I nearly got cleaned up by a taxi."
The following year, on January 29, 1969, Anderson was called up for National Service. He attended initial training at Puckapunyal and then to Corp training with the 8 Battalion at Enoggera in Brisbane. After a few more months of training, he boarded the HMAS Sydney with the main body of troops and was off to Vietnam.
On his way to Vietnam, Ian completed a Signals course, which proved helpful when, later, their Signal Operator got wounded, and he took over.
They arrived in Vietnam on November 17, 1969, and were there for 12 months, fighting in the Vietnam War.
At the end of their tour, in late October 1970, a football match was organised while they were packing up and ready to go home. Both teams turned up wearing the same coloured guernsey, khaki! Anderson lost the toss as team captain, and his team had to go skins.
Anderson returned home with the 8th Battalion Royal Australian Regiment on November 12, 1970.
Upon returning to Australia, Anderson enjoyed hay carting back at Wombelano.
He rejoined the Essendon Football Club in 1971 and got a job at Myer delivering furniture, but the ambition to play at the highest level had waned.
"My legs were not the same as before I left, and funnily enough, I found Melbourne boring compared to my previous two years," Anderson said.
"I only played six more senior games with Essendon in 1971."
Ian Anderson played 27 games and kicked 49 goals for the Essendon Football Club. He was one of six Essendon players to have served in Vietnam. The others were Keith Gent, Lindsay McGie, Ian Payne, Greg Perry and Bill Thompson.
In 1972, Anderson moved to Perth to play for West Perth.
"During my first practice match, I landed on the ball and began passing blood. As a result, one of my kidneys was later removed," Anderson said.
"When I returned from Vietnam, I experienced gut pain but was unsure of the cause until I arrived in Perth. I played the rest of my football career with only one kidney."
Despite that, he continued his football career with West Perth until mid-1974, even representing Western Australia in the 1972 Perth Carnival. There, he played alongside legendary players such as Graham Moss and Bill Dempsey, the former the other ruckman in the team who later won the 1976 Brownlow Medal. 19-year-old Mike Fitzpatrick was also in the team captained by Mal Brown.
Len Thompson, Jon Nicholls, and Gary Dempsey were just some of the names that represented Victoria.
After leaving West Perth, Anderson played with the Port Headland Rovers and won a premiership in 1974. Following eighteen months in Port Headland, he returned to the family farm in Wombelano.
He coached the local football team, Douglas Harrow Miga Lake, in the Central Wimmera Lowan Stars league in 1976, when they finished runners-up to Noradjuha.
He went to Casterton in 1977, starring in the first three games, where he polled eight votes in the league's best and fairest. However, a knock on his kidney caused issues, and he was forced to retire at the age of 28.
Over the last 40+ years, Anderson moved to Port Fairy and went to Vietnam 19 times to self-heal. On one of those occasions, a chance encounter changed everything.
"I was waking up with cold sweats, feeling aimless and unsettled," Anderson recalled.
"During one of my trips, I travelled around Long Hais mountains' silent hills in a van with my family. I asked the interpreter, Miss Suong, what a Vietnamese man was saying.
"It turned out that he fought in the same battle as me in February 1970. His name was Mr Ngan, a VC with the D445 Battalion.
"He spent 11 years in the Long Hais mountains and was wounded four times. I touched him on the top of the head and said, 'You missed me?'. He replied, 'You shoot at me first.' "
They became good friends, and he flew Mr Ngan and Miss Suong to Australia to Port Fairy to show them how Australians lived.
"On the way from Melbourne to Port Fairy, they couldn't understand why all the paddocks were empty with no crops," Anderson said.
"As a true Aussie, I taught Mr Ngan how to punt, drink and speak English. I taught him the words, 'one more' when he ordered a beer, and he kept winning mystery bets."
"I hope I didn't send him home a compulsive gambling alcoholic," Anderson joked.
Before Mr Ngan and Miss Suong returned to Vietnam, Anderson drove them to Adelaide, and they flew to the Gold Coast and saw Australia.
"Mr Ngan said that Australians were honourable enemies," Anderson said.
"I kept sending money back to Vietnam for the education of Miss Suong's son. I find all Vietnamese people lovely.
"I have three daughters, two from my first wife and one from a de facto relationship. Their mothers did an excellent job raising the girls virtually on their own."
Unfortunately, four weeks ago, Mr Ngan passed away at the age of 65. Anderson plans a 20th trip to Vietnam sometime in the next 12 months.
Living in Port Fairy, Anderson quietly supports the football club in the background.
"Football opened doors for me, and I decided to give it back quietly," Anderson said.
"My contribution, however, is minuscule compared to many others trying to get the club's second flag.
"Like all Vietnam veterans, I've had stuff going on in my head, but now, with all of this experience of going back to Vietnam and self-healing, I feel good.
"To sum it all up, I was an ordinary footballer. I was a reasonable soldier - not too brave, but I was a bloody good hay carter."
Anderson's entire story from the Vietnam War is in the newly released book 'Never Forgotten—Honouring our Veterans.'
It's produced by Big Sky Publishing and sold in bookstores and Big W stores nationwide. The book contains 38 veterans' stories.
