AFTER watching his son and daughter, as well as countless other sportsmen and women start out there, cricketing legend Brian Gainsford OAM has called it a day and is selling his family's 115-year-old Narromine property.
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Gainsford and wife Jill are currently packing up Brooklyn for a sea change, where they hope to spend more time with their children David and Melinda Gainsford-Taylor at Dee Why.
For Brian, the feeling is bittersweet for a number of reasons.
Brooklyn has been home to five generations and a place where former Olympic and Commonwealth Games athlete Melinda has returned home with her own family for many years.
Melinda is the dual 100 and 200-metre national record holder. She began running with Little Athletics at nine years of age where she was discovered by her coach, Jackie Byrnes, a woman who would stay with her throughout her athletic career.
Gainsford-Taylor is also a 200m world indoor champion, winning gold at Barcelona in 1995, making her the first Australian to do so since Betty Cuthbert.
She is a bronze and silver medalist at Commonwealth Games level, and gained selection to three Olympic teams.
Although officially retired, Gainsford-Taylor had her start at Brooklyn, even after she relocated to Sydney to attend St Vincent's boarding school. During her holidays, she would be seen training at any temperature, on any given day.
Her father remembers those days, particularly when both Melinda and son David competed in the Australian School Championships in Perth when they were younger.
"Melinda and David were both at school together and went to Perth and won gold medals. To me, that was the pinnacle as a parent," he said.
"That was after Melinda was identified by Jackie on that little oval in Trangie. It's those times that I'll remember. The good times."
Good old-fashioned backyard cricket at Brooklyn was the norm for son David and was the sport of choice for the now Sydney-sider, who followed in his father's footsteps and pursued a career in cricket.
David is currently a vice-president at the Manly Warringah Cricket club, a team he coached for three years and a team he played in for 13 years.
His son Samuel currently plays representative cricket, following in his father and grandfather's footsteps. His mother Jill, known as 'Jilly' to husband Brian, has been the backbone of the Gainsford family structure.
The mother, farmer’s wife and grandmother of five has unfortunately had two bouts of cancer at two times in her life.
She was diagnosed with parathyroid cancer at age 28 and had an inoperable non-Hodgkins lymphema. Both times she was told she had 14 months to live, and she survived both times.
Brian said their daughter Melinda was competing at an athletic competition in Sydney when she got the news her mother had cancer.
“I remember she told me that she would run for her mum, and she certainly did,” he said.
Jill, like her other family members, was a keen tennis player and loved athletics, the latter something she obviously passed on to her daughter.
Like his father before him, Brian joined the Backwater Cricket Club in the early 1960s as a teenager and played continuously for 44 seasons. He represented the Far West Cricket council in NSW Country program matches for 10 seasons. He also represented NSW Country versus City at the SCG in1973 and NSW Country versus West Indies at Dubbo in 1975.
Gainsford had a string of other administrative posts, including being chairman of the Western Zone Cricket Committee and the NSW Country Cricket Association, director of the NSW Cricket Association board and life membership of the NSW Cricket Association.
He received his Order of Australia Medal for 45 years of service in 2008, from governor of NSW Marie Bashir AC CVO.
Brian said it would be hard to say goodbye to his home of 46 years, but he was looking forward to seeing his children more often.
“The decision to sell has not been made in haste,” he said.
“We’ve been scaling down for a while now. The west Brooklyn property sold two years ago and the irrigation license was sold by the government’s buy-back scheme. The sale of Brooklyn attracted a lot of interest. We’re happy the property is in good hands.”
Gainsford said he was very happy with the decision but still wanted to thank the people of Narromine for their “fantastic” support towards Melinda before and after she got married (the wedding also took place at Brooklyn).
“Every time Melinda came home, she would pop in to the local businesses to say hello and see how everybody was. We’ll always remember how the Narromine community came together to support her throughout her life and it has been fantastic.
“That’s what we’ll miss the most,” he said.
The clearing sale of Brooklyn will take place this coming Saturday.