Sue and Brendan Davern
A chance meeting in the carpark on Sue’s last day at Coburg Teacher’s College began a love affair that’s produced 54 years of marriage and counting. More than 50 of those have been spent as Portsea GC members. Pondering which has been the happier relationship brings hails of laughter.
“We won’t answer that!” Sue says, playing along. Suffice to say both unions are ageing like fine wine.
Sue grew up in Bundoora when it was on Melbourne’s bushy outskirts, donning gumboots to collect the mail and being introduced to golf by her father in the paddocks across the road. “He’d finish work and we’d take a 7-iron and pitching wedge and hit balls back and forth.”
Dad played at Kilmore and was keen for his daughter to join him. Sue preferred netball, but had a game with her father and aunt one day to test the waters. “And I thought, ‘Oh, they’re all old ladies, I don’t really want to be part of this.’”
The turning of life’s wheel makes her smile. “Now I’m the old lady!”
Sue and Brendan Davern at their Wedding
Brendan was born in Albury, lost his father when he was four, and after a stint in North Melbourne grew up in Macleod. As a youngster he’d swing a club around the old Rosanna course along the railway line, but for much of his early adulthood cricket filled his Saturdays.
“We moved to Sorrento in 1974,” Sue says. Brendan adds, “I was a keen cricketer and joined Sorrento CC and footy club.” Sue: “I played netball of a nighttime.”
Brendan taught at Sorrento Primary School for 11 years, then Boneo where he became principal before taking the top job at Somers School Camp. His early golf was restricted to Sunday morning hits at Sorrento, where he asked about becoming a member.
Brendan appointed to teach at Sorrento Primary School
Living in town, working in town, playing sport in town, he was taken aback when the secretary responded, “Why do you want to join here?” So Brendan pointed his old Kingswood towards the end of the peninsula and as it crunched up the gravel driveway Portsea’s manager of the day, Laurie Jorgenson, bounded down the steps to greet him with open arms.
Sue takes up the story.
“Laurie said, ‘You can sign up today!’ Brendan said, ‘But I don’t know anyone.’ And Laurie said, ‘Yes you do – you know me now! Stay there, I’ll get a seconder!’ It was $60 a year and a $40 joining fee. We both joined.”
Of a warm first impression that’s never left him, Brendan adds:
“Portsea was just so welcoming, they were amazing. And I don’t think that culture has ever changed.”
Cricket and netball commitments, along with raising a young family, restricted the Daverns’ golf to school holidays and social hits during their early years as members. Once their busy lives allowed they played more, Sue off 18 at her best and Brendan 12 – for a solitary week.
“Every year it’s gone out, and out, and out,” he laughs of his handicap. He treasures the two holes in one he’s had at Portsea, particularly on the old 15th hole (current 19th hole) with its elevated green, and the reaction of Neil Pope and his group in front jumping up and down hollering as his ball – unseen from the tee – dropped into the hole.
Old 15th hole (current 19th hole)
Camaraderie has always mattered more than results. Brendan had a stint as ‘Bad Santa’ at the Thursday competition Christmas party, a ritual he would introduce by announcing, “If anybody is easily offended, please leave the room now.” His assistant was an “elf” nicknamed Tiny, a fellow member of such proportions Bad Santa could hide behind him and not be seen.
When Sue retired after many happy years teaching at Sorrento Primary School, she was approached by another female member and took her turn as Ladies Vice-President and President. “I was on a lot of committees with school – I learnt a lot, and it helps to give back. It’s time-consuming, but well worth it.”
She’s loved the support and respect women receive at the club, the sense that they are on equal footing with the men. “The men are very welcoming. We’re allowed to play Saturdays in the field, at other clubs its separated. They’re always very supportive of the things we do.”
Winners of the winter knockout (Brendan Davern & Gary Parker)
Of course not everybody can commit to being an office bearer. Brendan laughs to recall then-president Taffy Richards bailing him up in the old clubhouse and pitching that he’d been a member for long enough, perhaps it was time he joined the committee.
“My answer was, ‘Taffy, I go to work Monday to Friday to try and keep 350 kids happy, their parents happy, all my staff happy, the education department happy. I’ve got more chance of achieving that than I have of keeping members of a golf club happy, so why would I want to stuff up my weekend?’
“And he said, ‘Point taken.’”
Both love the informality of Portsea, from the veritable comedy act that Dorothy Pinnell and Jack Carr were in the old clubhouse days, to the spinning wheel, chook-throwing and today’s coloured discs (which Sue notes cost the disc-buying loser in each group $5 for men and $2.50 for women – “we’re the last of the big-spenders”).
“If you bring a guest here, straight away they feel absolutely comfortable,” Brendan says. “Just the fact that you can have a good old laugh.”
He loves that their golf club has been a haven for stories, always underpinned by good-natured humour. Like the former member who was a good friend, who had a swing that made Happy Gilmore look like a professional. When he was looking to buy new clubs, the Portsea pro of the time, Rob Moody, offered a free lesson if he purchased them from him.
“He bought the clubs, went for the lesson, and Ross said let’s see your golf swing.
“Then he said, ‘Actually, instead of a lesson, would you settle for a box of golf balls?’”
Sue is warmed by seeing more and more women join the club, working their way into the game with Monday morning lessons followed by nine holes. “They say the atmosphere is so lovely, everyone is friendly, it doesn’t matter who you play with.”
Neither of their two sons nor five grandchildren are golfers (“we tried!”), and their retirement features a mixture of activities, family and friends. Golf (Wednesday and Saturday for Sue, Thursday and Saturday for Brendan) is more prominent in their lives than ever. Annually they escape the Victorian winter, caravan in tow and golf clubs on board, for Queensland’s far north and become temporary members of Mossman Golf Club.
The Daverns with their 50-year member medals
“We have our weekly balance of things we do – grandchildren, and I work one day a week for my son in his accountancy business in Rosebud,” Brendan says. “But Wednesday, Thursday and Saturday, sorry, they’re golf days. Sacrosanct.”
He’s seen old cricket teammates migrate to lawn bowls, and wonders if they might be tempted.
Sue isn’t so sure. “Maybe we’ll just stay here and get a cart.”