Player, Administrator

Acraman arrived in the colony in 1846 and had many business interests. He was a keen sportsman, on the Board of Governors of St Peter’s College from 1873 to 1894, collector of fine arts, and one of the oldest members of the Adelaide Club.

St Peter’s College record that somewhere between 1854 and 1856 he arranged for five round footballs to be imported from England “inflated by means of a pig’s bladder”. He also supplied the first set of goal posts for the school. (1)

In the late 1850s and early 1860s it was likely they were playing Harrow rules, an early version of football developed at Harrow School and a predecessor to both rugby and association football. The rules used in the school’s games are unclear.

Acraman was involved in founding the original Adelaide Football Club on April 26, 1860, at the Globe Inn in Adelaide and “about half the early members were old scholars of St Peter’s College and a small number, probably two or three were St Peter’s students. The Club also included two members of the Legislative Council, the Speaker of the House of Assembly, and several lawyers and merchants” – quite an elite and select group of gentlemen. (1)

He still played during the 1860s and was president of the Adelaide Football Club.

(1) Collegiate School of St Peter, Adelaide. The Founding Years: 1847 to 1878, pp118-121, John Tregenza, published 1966.