When it comes to cricketers, there have been many as exciting on and off the pitch as Keith Ross Miller.

Miller played VFL, flew fighter planes in the war, and was one of, if not the greatest, all-rounder of all time.

Miller combined movie star looks and incredible charm off the field, with a dark side few got to see.

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Resources

Aside from lots of contemporary newspaper accounts, there ate quite a few books on Miller.

An older book and out of print that I found useful was Keith Miller; The Golden Nugget by R S Whitington and can be tracked down online.

Miller himself wrote quite extensively, such as in Cricket Crossfire be Keith Miller, again a second hand book these days but available online.

For a more contemporary version and ultimately the most authoritative account, is Miller's Luck: The Life and Loves of Keith Miller, Australia's Greatest All-Rounder by Roland Perry

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In the second part of our Lucky Baldwin series, Lucky had just escaped death after being shot by a jilted lover.

He followed that up by being shot by another lover almost immediately, which is careless. 

Lucky also managed to create a new town, which the Los Angeles Times described as a “gambling hell and booze pleasure park.”

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The Santa Anita Park is one of the most famous racetracks in America, a regular host of the Breeders' Cup, but its founder is little known.

Elias 'Lucky' Baldwin was a self-made millionaire, who left behind him a trail of wives, mistresses and unhappy business partners.

In business, he was lucky and shrewd, and his biography starts with the line, 'immoral, unmoral, amoral, Lucky Baldwin was all of them.'

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In 1964, one of Australia’s leading javelin throwers, Reg Spiers, was training in England when he failed to make the Australian Olympic team.

Things got worse when his wallet was stolen, leaving him completely broke.

He was stuck in England with no way to get home. Reg, however, was an out-of-the-box thinker. Perhaps there was a way to get home that would cost him nothing, it just had never been done before.

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Reg attracted a lot of attention back in the day, and has given countless interviews since which I drew on. The most definitive account is the book Out of the Box: The crazy true story of the Australian champion athlete who posted himself by Julie McSorley and Marcus McSorley and is worth checking out if you want the whole story.

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The MacRobertson Air Race got underway in spectacular fashion, with a pilot trying to take off but forgetting to release the brake.

Once in the air, things got only more confused, with emergency landings, crashes, and pilots getting arrested by Benito Mussolini’s men.

Soon the first planes would arrive in Australia, and the people of Albury would play a major role in saving one plane from disaster.

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Research

To research this I went through more aviation materials than I had ever thought possible. There are a heap of contemporary reports online and I had to dig deep to flesh out a lot of minor details, not all the reports line up.

The best book on the race is On a Wing and a Prayer: The Race that Stopped the World by Di Websdale-Morrissey and is a great account.

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In 1934, the 100th anniversary of the founding of Melbourne was celebrated by what was at the time, the most dangerous and ambitious race in world history, flying from England to Melbourne.

The race would see wooden biplanes go up against the first metal airliners and was funded by an Australian Willy Wonka, Sir Macpherson Robertson, inventor of Freddo Frog and Cherry Ripe.

The finest pilots of the age gathered in England, a man who flew with a lion cub, a married couple who argued over directions, and a man who once ‘bombed’ the English flagship, HMAS Queen Elizabeth, with toilet paper during a naval exercise.

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Research

To research this I went through more aviation materials than I had ever thought possible. There are a heap of contemporary reports online and I had to dig deep to flesh out a lot of minor details; not all the reports line up.

 The best book on the race is On a Wing and a Prayer: The Race that Stopped the World by Di Websdale-Morrissey and is a great account.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

On October 26, 1863, at the Freemason’s Tavern in Great Queen Street, London, representatives of various football clubs from across England met to try and figure out a universal set of rules for football.

This optimistic project fell apart over differences over whether you could run while holding the ball, and if you could kick an opponent in the shins.

The group split, one would form the Football Association, and the rest would go off an create Rugby.

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In 1823, William Webb Ellis picked up the ball and ran with it during a school match creating the "rugby" style of play. 

Except he didn’t, and the true story of how rugby emerged involved school uprisings, broken shins, and the invention of an origin story.

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On the 26th of September 1983, forty years ago, Australia II crossed the line to end the New York Yacht Club's 132-year-long winning streak.

To celebrate the anniversary, Mick and Titus sat down with winning skipper John Bertrand to learn more about what it took to win the America’s Cup.

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Research

There is no limit to the writings on the America’s Cup, and this was one of the biggest research jobs I’ve had.

Some of the key sources included:

A Full Cup: Sir Thomas Lipton's Extraordinary Life and His Quest for the America's Cup by Michael D'Antonio

The Quest for the America's Cup: Sailing to Victory by Richard V. Simpson

Exposed: The Dark Side of the America’s Cup by Alan Sefton and Larry Keating

Of course, the great man joined us and his book is Born To Win: The Power Of A Vision by John Bertrand.

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In 1983, Alan Bond would go all in for the Cup, bringing together John Bertrand and Ben Lexcen in an all-out assault on the New York Yacht Club.

The Australians would bring their winged keel, and perhaps more importantly, their mind tricks, as they fought the Americans in court and out on the water.

Titus O’Reily and Mick Molloy recount the year the Australians challenged for the cup and for the first time in 132 years, prised it from the New York Yacht Club’s iron grip.

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Research

There is no limit to the writings on the America’s Cup, and this was one of the biggest research jobs I’ve had.

Some of the key sources included:

A Full Cup: Sir Thomas Lipton's Extraordinary Life and His Quest for the America's Cup by Michael D'Antonio

The Quest for the America's Cup: Sailing to Victory by Richard V. Simpson

Exposed: The Dark Side of the America’s Cup by Alan Sefton and Larry Keating

Of course, the great man joined us and his book is Born To Win: The Power Of A Vision by John Bertrand.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.