The family of football legend Charlie Sutton say they are honoured at a suggestion from the community to rename Seaholme’s Surf Street to Sutton Street in his honour.
Hobsons Bay council has been approached to change the name of the tiny street in honour of the Western Bulldogs’ 1954 premiership captain, who lived on its south-western corner.
His son, Charles, said his mum and dad bought the house in the 1960s.
“Dad would be really honoured,” he said.
Under Hobsons Bay council’s naming policy, the person being commemorated must be shown to have had a direct and long-term association with the feature or have made a significant contribution to the area or region.
Mr Sutton’s daughter, Pam Sutton, said the family had a long connection to Altona and surrounds.
Her mother bought a house in Upton Street when Pam was born in 1944 while her father was serving with the army in Alice Springs.
When he returned in 1945, Mr Sutton worked as a truck driver, working at the RAAF base in Point Cook and from the Altona quarry where Altona Gate shopping centre now stands.
“We didn’t have any made roads in Altona and dad had a horse tethered in the street,” Ms Sutton said.
“We didn’t have a kitchen sink. Mum washed out of a basin. Dad won a reward from a hardware store in Footscray and chose a kitchen sink.”
Ms Sutton said for a few years the family owned the Commercial Hotel in Yarraville and the former Albert Hotel in Footscray, but her mother was anxious to return to Altona.
“Mum’s ancestors settled on the corner of Mount and Blyth in the early 1900s in a tent,” she said.
Ms Sutton said the idea of renaming the street in her father’s honour came as the Western Bulldogs entered an exciting new era.
“Dad always wanted Chris Grant or Brad Johnson to take his team to a premiership and then he wanted Robert [Murphy],” she said. “They’re his three favourite boys.”
Ms Sutton said her father loved the club so much, she caught him sneaking out to attend training just days before his death in 2012, aged 88.
“I said, ‘You’re not going to training are you’, because he was dressed nicely … he said, ‘Oh no’. As soon as I drove off, he went and drove to training, and he was nearly dead.
“He was so devoted to that club – he just bled red, white and blue.”
