Young Bradman

36 School and district years in this period, why did he not go to Sydney to see the MCC tourists of 1924/25 His uncle Richard Whatman had a tennis court, ‘and I was always free to play on it’. Although most of the women he was playing tennis with were married, tennis was an obvious place where young men could respectably meet young women. In July 1924, Victor Bradman became engaged to Vera Limond of Wildes Meadow, ten miles south of Bowral; in July 1925, he placed an advert in the local newspaper to sell a 1924 BSA motorcycle. Was Vic having to give up a single man’s machine?! Because, in 1928, he was advertising for sale a motorcycle and sidecar. Don was already in love, but was keeping himself free to follow his path. In the 1996 interview, Ray Martin asked Sir Donald: ‘When did you first fall in love with Jessie Menzies?’ Err, I think that would be the day she came to live with us when I was about 12 years of age. I remember the day very well because I had been sent down the street by my mother on a mission to buy some groceries, and I ran into the doctor’s car ... on my bike, and had an accident. He had to take me home; I had my nose all cut and scratches all over my face. And when I got home she was there at the door, having just been delivered by her father, because she was going to stay with us for 12 months and go to school. And we went to school together every day for the rest of that year. That was when I fell in love with her, that very first day. I don’t think she fell in love with me until much later, because I was a terrible sight the day she saw me. Bradman decided he was going to marry her, ‘very shortly afterwards’. This mattered because it saved Bradman from distraction, until he had made it as a cricketer. Sadly the details are missing. Did the two have an understanding, before Bradman asked to become engaged before the 1930 tour? (‘She said, wait until you get back from England … and I did, straight away.’) If not, didn’t Bradman risk losing her? In the garden at the Bradmans’ home, Ray Martin did ask her when she fell in love with him. Looking towards her husband, she answered: ‘Well, it was a gradual affair from school, wasn’t it?’ Sir Donald replied: ‘Well, I don’t know, you’re the one answering the question.’ Like George Bradman in 1930, Lady Bradman was strangely defensive, maybe because, as both knew, her love for him did not come as soon as his for her. Not that it mattered much by then, if ever. The other distraction, or hurdle, was work. Bradman had started with Percy Westbrook of Davis and Westbrook, Bowral auctioneers and estate agents since 1872. In another example of how the Southern Highlands was a small world, in August 1926 Westbrook beat George Whatman at bowls on Bowral green for the ‘Cock o’ the Walk’ trophy. Mr Westbrook (‘to whom I owe a deep debt of gratitude’, Bradman admitted in 1930) mattered because he was so generous – to a point. Saturday was an estate agent’s busy day. Cricket in the Southern Highlands, Sydney and England alike ran on a Saturday afternoon so that workers typically finished their five and a half day week on Saturday lunchtime. Mr Westbrook gave Bradman all Saturday to travel from Bowral to play grade cricket in Sydney from the summer of 1926/27. The employer also solved what Bradman called ‘a