Denning, who was also the last surviving member of Fitzroy’s premiership team of 1944, held the remarkable distinction of booting six goals from his first six kicks on debut for the Blues, in the fourth round of the 1935 season, against South Melbourne at the Lake Oval.
In what was his final interview with this reporter at his home in Wantirna South two years ago, Denning revealed that his great friendship with the former West Australian and Carlton centreman, Ron “Socks” Cooper contributed to the extraordinary goalkicking performance.
“I can only remember the first goal,” Clen said at the time. “It’s a long time ago after all - 72 years in fact.
“I remember kicking the goal after Ron Cooper passed the ball to me. Anyhow, another one of the Carlton players, I won’t mention his name, said to Ron ‘What the hell did you kick it to him for?’. Ron replied ‘He was in a better position,” but the truth was that Ron was a workmate. He and I worked together for the city council as linemen up the electric telegraph poles.”
It was also the year John Curtin replaced Jim Scullin as leader of the Australian Labor Party and aviator Charles Kingsford-Smith, perched behind the controls of the Lady Southern Cross, disappeared off the coast of Burma.
The walls of his retirement home in Melbourne’s eastern suburbs were long decked with memories of his rich footballing past - the team photos from Oakleigh, Fitzroy and Victoria for whom he served with great distinction - and of course the all-too-brief days at Princes Park.
Born on February 28, 1911, Clen Charles Denning inherited his unusual Christian name from his father, Thomas Clen Denning, but “wouldn’t have a clue” regarding the name’s origins.
Clen cut his footballing teeth with Oakleigh, completing his senior debut barely a month after turning 16. Then, when Oakleigh’s senior coach Frank Maher took the helm as coach of Carlton, he went with him.
Clen made an immediate impression at Carlton - initially sporting the no.34 guernsey later worn by the likes of premiership players Ian Robertson and Alex Marcou, and more recently Ron De Iulio and Simon Wiggins - and finally the no.35 guernsey made famous by premiership players Jack Conley and Peter Dean.
“In those days you trained two nights a week and played on a Saturday, because everybody had jobs in those days . . . but they don’t have them now, do they?,” Clen said.
“They were all good players then - ‘Soapy’ Vallence, Keith Shea, ‘Ansell’ Clarke, ‘Mickey’ Price and Ron Cooper who was a top bloke - but I never got a go there and I don’t know why.”
For whatever reason, Clen had a falling out with Maher’s successor as coach, Percy Rowe. More than likely, the dispute involved Clen’s inability to dislodge Vallence, then in his penultimate season at Carlton, from the full-forward position.
“I know Soapy was full-forward, and one day I played well alongside him,” Clen explained.
“Soapy said (to the selectors) ‘Leave him at centre half-forward, I’ll get on well with him’, but they didn’t stick with me there and I never really got a go, so I left Carlton and went to Fitzroy.
“Years later I bumped into one of the Carlton selectors playing bowls. The selector said to me, ‘Oh Clen Denning, I remember you’, to which I replied, ‘Yeah, I remember you - a rotten bloomin’ selector you were too.”
The move from Royal Parade to Brunswick Street cost Clen a place in Carlton’s 1938 Grand Final outfit, but he forged ahead at Fitzroy regardless. He took out the Gorillas’ goalkicking award with 37 goals in 1939, but finally made his mark as an unrelenting back pocket who took on the best of them - South’s Laurie Nash included.
In the end, Clen represented Fitzroy with distinction in its famed 1944 premiership team, turning out in a back pocket alongside the resident full-back and captain-coach Fred Hughson.
“I got paid three pound a week to play a game of footy,” Clen recalls, but when we won the premiership we got 20 pound for it and they chucked in an extra seven or eight pound.”
Denning was 36 when he gave League football away in 1947 to take on the job as captain-coach of Ararat. Again, Clen would make his mark, featuring in the Rats’ first and only Wimmera League Premiership with a six goal caning of arch-rival Stawell.
It wasn’t until 1950 that Clen finally hung up the boots at the ripe old age of 39.
Most of Clen Denning’s old teammates had gone by the time he granted this interview, but to the end his love for the game remained.
As he said: “Time’s nothing to me now, but it would be nice to be 18 and running out again.”
Clarke forged his career on both sides of the Nullabor, turning out in 77 matches for West Perth between 1950 and ’54, six state appearances for Western Australia, one solitary match for Melbourne in 1955 and 57 more for the mighty Blues between 1956 and ’59.
In that period, Clarke shared following duties with Ken Hands, Graham Donaldson and, for one solitary game, the great John Nicholls.
Earlier today, Hands related an extraordinary tale involving Clarke, whom he described as a tall thin bloke, a good tryer, but just an average ruckman”.
“In 1957, in the lead-up to the last home and away game against Essendon at Essendon, I was carrying an injury and so it was agreed at a match committee meeting on the Thursday night that I not play,” Hands recalled.
“I was to take my gear to the ground, but Kevin Clarke was to replace me and he did.
“I then played in the first semi against Hawthorn, but come the next year the s..t hit the fan. The members of the match committee said ‘You refused to play against Essendon’, and they also accused me of not trying in the first semi. I said ‘What?’ and asked them to produce the minutes of the original meeting, but they wouldn’t produce the minutes. I thought ‘This is lovely, I’m not going to have a bar of this’, and I never played again.”