Post-War Boom Time

POST-WAR REBUILDING
03 July 1945

With an increasing number of players called-up to fight in WWII, and the Athletic Grounds commandeered for recruit training, Hornets dropped out of the wartime Lancashire League. Their last match was a 12-4 defeat against Salford at the Athletic Grounds on 11 May 1940.

In July 1945, with the war over, an appeal went out to supporters for help in renovating the ground, pitches and premises so that matches could resume.

The promotion of rugby league in the town continued and an initiative between the Hornets’ Supporters Club, the Schools Games & Sports Association and Rochdale Amateur Rugby League saw the game introduced into local schools in 1947.

In 1948 Hornets made it to the semi-finals of the Challenge Cup but Wigan ended their hopes of a Wembley final, winning 11-nil at Station Road, Swinton.


FLYING WALLY McARTHUR

Lightning: Wally McArthur

On 23 November 1953 a young Aboriginal Australian named Wally McArthur arrived at the Athletic Grounds. Not yet twenty years old, he made his debut for the Club on 12 December in a match against Salford where he kicked three goals. However he is perhaps best remembered by supporters as the fastest man they had even seen carrying a rugby league ball.

Indeed, back in Australia, Wally was regarded as a contender for an Olympic Games place.  He held the South Australian 100 and 220 yards junior titles for two years and had an unofficial track time of 9.7 seconds for the 100 yards. Journalist John Pilger claims his lack of selection for the Olympics Games was due to racial discrimination.

Wally broke the Hornets points record

McArthur was interested in playing Australian Rules Football but was denied doing this because of a colour bar. Instead he joined rugby league club, Semaphore, in the Adelaide area, where he scored more than 900 points in five seasons. He also represented South Australia.

Wally McArthur played for the Hornets for 14 months between 1953 and 1955. He became a fans’ favourite, equalling the points scoring record for the club.

He left Hornets for Blackpool on 1 February 1955 and went on to play for Salford and Workington Town, making 165 appearances before eventually moving back to Australia.

Wally was inducted into the Aboriginal and Islander Sports Hall of Fame in 1994 and, in 2008, the centenary of rugby league in Australia, he was named in the Aboriginal Australian rugby league team of the century.
He passed away in 2015 aged 81.

RECORD POPULARITY

October 1954
In 1954, Hornets were recording an average weekly attendance of over 10,000. The first seven home games of that season attracted 75,689 spectators which included Hornets’ highest attendance in a league match when they played Oldham in front of 19,654 people on 16 October 1954. The image below shows a packed Athletic Grounds as Hornets beat the then new Blackpool Borough by 37-8 on 28 August of that year.

In 1958 Hornets made it to a Challenge Cup semi-final but Wigan again proved too strong for them, as they had done ten years earlier.

 The photograph below shows George Parson, the Hornets captain - followed by Teddy Cahill -  with Eric Ashton, the Wigan captain, ahead of the 1958 match.