Vale Dr John O'Gorman - Wallaby No. 462

1 June 1936 - 23 December 2024

In the distant days of amateur rugby tours of the 1960s, the Wallabies travelled with no entourage of medical and sporting scientists. Back then, it was up to junior doctor and med student players in the team like John O’Gorman to offer what continuity of care they could during long months of touring.

“When I went to John O’Gorman to ask what I should do for my sore foot, he told me I should ‘limp’’, recalled fellow 1966/7 Wallaby tourist Russ Tulloch. “But in the game against Newport he actually saved a fellow’s life. We tackled Welsh centre Gordon Britton and he landed on the ground and went into a fit and started to choke. O’Gorman realised the player had swallowed his tongue and called to the winger to bring the corner flag, and stuck it in his mouth to jam it open so he could get his finger in and pull his tongue out.”

The incident has now passed into rugby folklore.

With the death of Dr John O’Gorman, whose memorial service was held at Manly in January, Australian rugby has lost yet another living link to the first truly ‘golden’ Wallaby era. He was there on the seminal 1961 Wallabies tour of South Africa, when the side wore all-gold jerseys for the first time, and remained a stalwart in the side through an unprecedented era of success up until 1967.

His captains John Thornett and Ken Catchpole were only recently judged “immortals of the game” by legendary rugby commentator Gordon Bray in his new book, for this was the era when the Wallabies went from “easy beats” to “world-beaters”, and John O’Gorman was an integral member in the team’s success.

Born in Sydney in 1936, he was the son of Jack and Enna O’Gorman, and eldest of six children - John, Maryanne, June, Virginia, Gary and Mark. His mother took the children to Gundagai following the Japanese submarine attack on Sydney Harbour during World War Two, and John was later sent to boarding school on a scholarship to St Joseph’s College, Hunters Hill, where he played in the First XV in 1953 and 1954 and rowed in the First Eight.

But the road to Wallaby gold all began at Villa Maria primary school, in Hunters Hill. “I first started playing rugby when I was in sixth class at school, and then went to St Joseph’s - a world renowned rugby school in Sydney,” O’Gorman told me in 2016 for Sometimes the Best Ever, a documentary about the 1966/7 Wallabies. “I had only played on the wing, until a famous coach there called Brother Henry saw me and said ‘son, you’re not a winger, you’re a No. 8’. So, I owe a lot to him, because - if I’d played on the wing I wouldn’t have made any representations at all.”

From 1955, O’Gorman played at Sydney Uni, where he studied medicine and ran out in 105 first grade games, including in the 1961 and ’62 premiership sides coached by the late Dr Dick Tooth, who remembered a larrikin sense of humour in the young O’Gorman.

Ex-students could not continue playing for Uni in those days, so O’Gorman joined Manly after graduating and played there from 1965 to 1967. O’Gorman got his first sweet taste of rugby touring in 1956 with the historic Australian Universities Tour of Japan, captained by Tooth. This ground breaking tour was part Post-War diplomatic mission, and drew huge crowds.

He demonstrated all round skills and an unusual mobility on the paddock for that era. His rugby mates nicknamed him ‘Cyrano’ in honour of a prodigious nasal profile, which was reminiscent of the swashbuckling French literary character, and offered concord-like aerodynamics for quick dashes up the field.

“I remember when he arrived at Sydney Uni Rugby Club - this tall angular chap - a very fast forward around the field,” recalls teammate Prof. Saxon White. “He was not a big heavy man, and that was good because he could get across the field. He played lock forward, occasionally in the second row, and was a very good line out forward who started to make his mark in about 1956.”

High flying lineout specialist Rob Heming, who played alongside O’Gorman in the scrum at Manly and for Australia, concurred: “He was hard and fast - and played in nearly all the tests, so he was pretty good.”

This speed was new for rugby forwards. “When I first started playing, front row forwards would hardly get out of a trot, they just scrummaged all the time and were great big hulks of guys” O’Gorman told me. “After a few years they changed the rules so you had to be quick and good on your feet as well, not just give the ball to the backs so they’d get all the praise.”

O’Gorman drove taxis while studying to make ends meet. Manly and Wallaby teammate Jim Miller recalls that, in those amateur rugby days, O’Gorman used his Wallaby clothes and kit bag when first practising as a doctor after retiring from the five-month northern hemisphere tour, on which players were paid “a dollar a day” to keep them in toothpaste and shaving cream.

“It was a great honour to represent your country,” O’Gorman said. “Money didn’t come into it in my day - even when you played for your state or the Wallabies, you got a pat on the back and that was about all.”

After debuting for New South Wales against Queensland in 1961, O’Gorman ran out in national colours (green) for the first time against Fiji, playing No.8. He was selected for the 1961 short tour of South Africa, which was captained (and coached) by the 21-year-old prodigy Ken Catchpole. Later that year, he played on the flank against France in Sydney, during their first Test appearance in Australia (and the last by the Wallabies in the old green jerseys).

1961 in South Africa was a turning point and O’Gorman played on the flank in both Tests. “The first Test we played was up at Ellis Park - our scrum was belted, and we were well and truly flogged,” recalls five eight John ‘Sparrow’ Dowse. “The second Test came around and we were actually very unlucky to lose - the turn around was quite remarkable — and that game showed  a couple of flaws in their play, and a couple of strengths in our play, that John Thornett kept in his mind when the Wallabies went back in 1963, and instead of being pummelled all over the place, they drew the series, which was unheard of in those days.”

The success that was to come hinged on a superb camaraderie and determination under the inspirational leadership of John Thornett and a supremely talented core of players emerging in key positions, including Catchpole at halfback, Peter Johnson at hooker, Rob Heming in lineouts and Greg Davis and Jules Guerassimoff at breakaway.

Thornett took over the captaincy in 1962. That year, O’Gorman played flanker in his only Test against the touring All Blacks, putting in a strong performance, but missing that year’s tour to New Zealand owing to medical studies. In 1963, O’Gorman returned to No 8. in the landmark Test that saw Australia defeat England in deep mud in Sydney - the first Australian victory over a major rugby nation on Australian soil since 1934.

O’Gorman then toured with the 1963 Wallabies to Southern Africa. The side drew the series and won the first back-to-back victories by any nation over South Africa since 1896. In the final three Tests, the hard tackling flanker combination of Guerassimoff and Davis emerged, with O’Gorman at No.8.

The Wallabies might have won the series were it not for the disconcerting experience of a race riot with shots fired in the final Test (in the segregated stands, the designated "black" sections had been cheering on the Wallabies). Or perhaps it was simply the exhilaration of the exotic safari touring of Africa from the Equator to the Cape that finally took the wind out of the Wallaby sails (prop Les Austin will still warn you off trying the elephant steak or monkey meat the Wallabies were served in Zimbabwe).

O’Gorman made himself unavailable in 1964, while studying his last year of medicine, and missed the tour and historic third Test walloping of New Zealand in Wellington. But “Dr” O’Gorman was back on the flank for the first ever series win against South Africa when they toured Australia in 1965 and, in a crowning achievement, was selected for the “Grand Tour” to the British Isles, France and Canada of 1966/7, playing No.8 in all five Tests.
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On that tour, the Wallabies defeated Wales and the Barbarians for the first time and inflicted the greatest home defeat on England the world had seen. O’Gorman scored a memorable try against the Barbarians in a match that ended with 40,000 Welshmen singing Waltzing Matilda in appreciation for the visiting Wallabies, who Thornett called “sometimes the best” he’d ever played with.

“I enjoyed rugby touring immensely, you meet some wonderful people and make some great friends on and off the field” O’Gorman recalled 50 years later. “In those days, the tours only came around once every nine or ten years - so it was a great experience and I am very fortunate.”

O’Gorman played his 18th and final test for Australia against Ireland in Sydney in 1967. He then took an opportunity in the bush to become resident doctor at Walgett and captained and coached the Walgett Rams in 1970 and 1971. “We won the premiership one year,” he recalled. “It’s great coaching country rugby, because they’re in it not to be selected, but for playing for the club.”

When I interviewed O’Gorman first in 2016, he had already entered the ‘long goodbye’ of encroaching dementia, but the essence of his rugby adventures remained with him through the fog, and his family made every effort to keep him attending Wallaby reunions.

“The friendships are wonderful and we don’t talk about rugby all the time,” he told me. “We just talk about life and how lucky we all were to get selected in the first place. I can’t think of anybody who knocks back an opportunity to come and have a get together with some of the Wallabies. It’s great camaraderie, loyalty,  friendship and all those good things - and we didn’t get paid a cent!”
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John O’Gorman married Juanita Zalapa, with whom he had two sons Jeremy and John, and four grandchildren - Zac, Xander, Antonia and Summer. Juanita sadly passed away in 1974 and many years later John was blessed to meet Helen Bowie-Wilson. After Walgett, O’Gorman practised as a GP at Liverpool before settling on a practice at Kirribilli, where he saw out the last 20 years of his career. 
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