Named in the centre in the Queensland Team of the Century, he was a football talent who ranks with the very best Queensland players of all-time.
A product of Taringa State School via Brisbane Boys College and a champion QAFL player with first Taringa and later Western Districts, he won the Grogan Medal in 1946-47 and was runner-up by a vote in 1950 after having won the equivalent DeLittle Medal in 1940.
This ranks him with 1930s star Jim Davies (1934-35-38) and 21st century journeyman Matthew Payne (2006-11-20) as the only triple winners of the League’s senior B&F medal. And but for the intervention of World War II service from 1942-45, when he was in his prime, he could quite easily have added to his treasure chest.
A Queensland Schoolboys captain, he demonstrated his liking for medals early when he won the QAFL Reserves Medal as a 16-year-old in 1936 playing for Taringa despite missing almost half the season and making his senior debut along the way.
He played in Sydney and with the Footscray Reserves during the war, where he broke his ankle, and returned to dominate the QAFL with the newly named Western Districts, which carried the same colours and the same players as Taringa.
A trustee, foundation member and inaugural captain for the transformation from Taringa to Western Districts, he played more than 20 games for Queensland from 1940-50, and was captain from the 1949 carnival through until 1952.
Was also a highly-regarded club and State coach, winning the NFC Merit Award in 1958, and after he retired in 1959 was club president from 1961-64..
A gentleman of the highest calibre and a much-sought-after public speaker, he was revered as a mentor and leader at club level and in broader circles within Queensland. An early pioneer of coaching development in Queensland, he was appointed the first State Director of Coaching but sadly passed away before taking up the appointment, allowing Ron Spalding to fill this role.
Doug Pittard was inducted into the Queensland Football Hall of Fame in 2008 and elevated to Legend status in 2023.
AFLQ QLD
Partners
