Tom Wills
Tom Wills | |
|---|---|
Statue at the Melbourne Cricket Ground of Tom Wills umpiring the first game of Australian rules football in 1858 | |
| Born | August 19, 1835 |
| Died | May 2, 1880 (aged 44) Heidelberg, Victoria, Australia |
| Cause of death | Suicide by stabbing[2] |
Thomas Wentworth "Tom" Wills (19 August 1835 – 3 May 1880) was an Australian all-round sportsman who helped invent Australian rules football and helped write the Laws of Australian Football.[3][2]
Wills was born in south-eastern New South Wales, Australia, near either Gundagai or Queanbeyan.[1]
From the age of 14, he went to Rugby School, in England. There, he played both rugby football and cricket very well. By his final year in England, he was captain of the Rugby XI and was listed in Bell's Life in Victoria and Sporting Chronicle as being one of the most promising young cricketers in England.
In 1859, Wills was involved with others in creating a set of football rules that would be a cross between rugby, soccer and Gaelic football. He made the game for cricketers to keep in shape during the off-season (winter). He had help from people such as his cousin Henry Colden Harrison, W.J. Hammersly and J.B. Thompson. The game is now called Australian Rules Football.[4]
Wills grew up with Indigenous Australians. He spoke the language of the Djab Wurrung people, who lived near him, and played with their children. It has been suggested that Australian rules football is based in part on Marn Grook, an Indigenous game with some rules that are similar to those of to Australian rules football. Because the Djab Wurrung played Marn Grook, Wills would have been influenced by the game in creating the rules for Australian rules football.[5]
Willis, an alcoholic, committed suicide by stabbing himself in the heart after he had escaped from a psychiatric hospital.
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 Family history states 19 August near Gundagai (reference "Thomas Wentworth Wills". An Index of Australian Wills Families: Descendants of Edward Wills. Tom Wills. 2006. Archived from the original on 2011-09-29. Retrieved 2006-07-05.) However, the Australian Dictionary of Biography entry (reference: W. F. Mandle (1976). "Wills, Thomas Wentworth (1835–1880)". Wills, Thomas Wentworth Spencer (1835 - 1880). National Centre of Biography, Australian National University. Archived from the original on 2008-08-07. Retrieved 2008-11-25.) gives the date of birth as 19 December and the location as on the Molonglo Plains, near present day Queanbeyan, New South Wales.
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 "Tom Wills: His Spectacular Rise and Tragic Fall - biography by Greg de Moore". Reading Victoria > The Summer Read > 2008 > Shortlist. State Library of Australia. Archived from the original on 2009-02-20. Retrieved 2008-11-25.
- ↑ "Tom Wills".
- ↑ W. F. Mandle (1976). "Wills, Thomas Wentworth Spencer (1835 - 1880)". Australian Dictionary of Biography. Australian National University. Retrieved 2008-11-25.
- ↑ "Australian rules football: Australian Football League" (PDF). What’s the score? A survey of cultural diversity and racism in Australian sport. Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission. 2007. Archived from the original (pdf (18 pages) on 2008-10-30. Retrieved 2008-11-25.