Our family's passion for the Swans started in the 1920's when my grandfather, William (Bill) Fogarty, left the small Western District town of Koroit Victoria to find his fortune in Melbourne.

Looking for accommodation he found it with a husband and wife named Roy and Elizabeth Cazaly, yes it was the Swans legend, the great Up There Cazaly.

My Nan told me how she felt like a Queen when the Cazaly's would take them to the football in the Cazaly's car, not too many people had cars in the 1920's, and since those days my family has been in love with the Red and White.

My grandfather told me stories of watching Cazaly, Laurie Nash, Herbie Mathews, Bob Pratt and going to the 1933 Grand Final and I was so jealous that he had seen a Premiership and I hadn't, hadn't that is, until the age of 48. He told me the story of the Blood-Stained Angels and the shortening of that to just "The Bloods".

My Mum, Pat, told me about going to the 1945 blood bath Grand Final with her dad and remembering it raining for most of the day and the fights on the ground. My grandfather regaled me with his version of the day – that it was Carlton that started the fights and then South were hell bent on giving it back to Carlton and didn't concentrate on getting the football.

He told me a South Melbourne player, Les Whyte, in a last-quarter melee, had a run in with a goal umpire and as the umpires were trying to report him, he ran off lifting his jumper over his head so the umpires couldn't see his number, hoping that without knowing his number he couldn't be reported.

Mum was one of three daughters, and all were raised in a very South Melbourne Football Club home, they lived in and around Albert Park, South Melbourne, and St Kilda. My cousins were all Swans, as were my siblings, although over the years some drifted off to support other teams. My brother Neil had a stint at Fitzroy and St Kilda, ending up at Sandringham where he won a Liston. The only two things that stopped me going from suburban football to greater heights was heart and skill, but even with my brother playing with other VFL sides, my passion for this club never wavered.

Memories of the Albert Park Ground are still vivid in my mind – the Palm trees on the lake side, the old press box, the grandstand. We always stood in standing room on the half forward flank (kicking to the grandstand end) next to the new stand and watched our team on a weekly basis.

My Mum's favourite players were Ron Clegg, in the 1950's, and after him the one and only Bob Skilton. We even, after Bob retired from the VFL, travelled to the VFA Oakleigh Football ground, where Bob was playing for Port Melbourne, to watch the little master.

Times were often bleak following the red and white, and this forged an intense dislike for every other team because every other supporter would heap ridicule on me for barracking for South Melbourne – at the time we were the easy beats of the competition.

I remember being on holidays in Lakes Entrance with my Dad, Mum, and siblings and woke to the news that Peter Bedford had won the Brownlow. It was 1970 and what a year that was, we made the finals for the first time since 1945.

Earlier that year we travelled to Geelong to support our team. I remember it because Doug Wade, the Geelong Champion full forward, was lining up for goal in the tense last quarter, and this was a game we had to win to play in the finals. As he ran in to kick for goal, a half-eaten apple was thrown at Wade. It didn't hit him, it hit the football just as it was leaving his boot and skewed the ball for a point allowing us the win. To that Swans supporter who threw the apple, a huge thanks.

I won't go into the disappointment of playing St KiIda in the final, only to say that I believe Norm Smith, our coach that year, said he didn't want the second quarter to end – it was the only quarter we won. Unfortunately, it was not good enough and we were out of the finals.

In 1981, a year that I hated, my beloved team was going to Sydney, Sin City, how was I going to support a team in another state. At the end of ‘81 they had a members’ vote at the South Melbourne Town Hall to agree or not to the relocation to Sydney. Desperate to stop the move I rang the club to sign up for a membership so I could vote, only to be told I could buy a membership, but I didn't have a vote as you had to be signed up before the end of June 1981to be eligible.

What was I going to do in 1982? I had no club in Melbourne, there was even an ad placed in the Sunday paper by the St KiIda Football Club asking for old Swans supporters to come down the road and barrack for them. I was in a conundrum but I couldn't follow other teams as they had supporters who laughed at the Swans.

I think it was the first round of 1982 and I turned the TV on and, as an interest, watched the game beaming in from Sydney. There they were, Barry Round, Bernie Evans, Stevie Wright, Mark Browning, and the rest of the boys, and I couldn't barrack against them. I was hooked again. My life was in balance.

As a proud supporter I had to marry a girl who also followed the Swans. My wife Lee, my children, Mat, Jess and Caitlyn, are all Swans, however my son, who was probably around 9 or 10 at the time and, obviously due to schoolyard pressure, came home from school and told me he wasn't going to follow the Swans but Collingwood. I looked him in the eye and asked where he would be sleeping in the future as NO Collingwood supporter was going to sleep under my roof. That was a very short-lived experience for him.

I have been to the 1996, 2005, 2006, 2012, 2014, 2016 and 2022 Grand Finals. At the 2022 Grand Final I was accompanied by my two daughters and my 10-year-old granddaughter, Evie, a passionate- as-you-can-get Swannie. She told me when she was about seven that she was going to marry Buddy, but sadly I had to tell her that he was already married. She represents the fifth generation of Swans supporters in my family.

I have had the honour to meet Bob Skilton, John Heriot (full back, in our Team of the Century) and Tony Morwood (half forward flank in the Team of the Century). There is a saying that one may be disappointed to actually meet your heroes, as they often do not live up to your expectations, but all I can say is that these men are the epitome of politeness, humility and the Bloods culture – they are true gentlemen.

To South Melbourne/Sydney Swans and Richard Colless, (who gave two cities, one team) thank you for everything.

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