The 1894 Tasmanian Football Season Pictorial Record

Launceston achieved great success in the NTFA with its third premiership in a row. It became the first club in the NTFA to achieve this distinction. Railway won the STFA premiership. Kingston withdrew from the Association. The main grandstand was the H.C Smith The small stand next to it is known as the Ladies Stand, and was completed in 1894. For the first time in many seasons there was no VFA Club touring Tasmania. 1881 was the first tour by the Hotham Club. The North West Football Association was formed in Devonport with Mersey, Latrobe, Devonport, Wesley Vale and Ulverstone. After a meeting in the Formby Hotel, Devonport, in 1894, the founding clubs were Devonport, Latrobe, Mersey and Ulverstone. The North Western Football Association was the senior football body in the North West. This publication is one of a series that provides details of the season of the Tasmanian Football Association from its inception in 1879 through to the colonial seasons. The early years of Association football in Tasmania have been little published. They should be recognised as the foundation years of football in Tasmania. This series of publications is the result of research to collect and collate the details of the seasons in the first years of organised football competition in Tasmania. These important seasons established Australian Rules football as an integral part of the sporting landscape of Tasmania. It has become very evident that the passion and fervour experienced now as players and followers of the game, was familiar to those connected with the game in this foundation era. The features of the game, attendances and interest in the game made football a very significant feature of the sporting communities of Tasmania at the time. It is hoped that these publications make an addition to the documentation of these pioneering early years of football in Tasmania.