It is with sadness we farewell another longstanding life member of the Ainslie Football Club family, Clare Palmer.

Clare was a pioneer for women’s involvement in the administrative side of both the Ainslie and ACT juniors and the Ainslie seniors and in her later years was a key driver in retaining and cataloguing historical records of the football club.

Clare died on 26 December 2025 at Arcare Aranda where she and Brian lived for the past few months. Before that they lived ‘around the corner’ from the club in Dickson in the same house for 65 years.

Clare’s involvement in the football club started in 1961 when Brian was recruited to the senior side following their relocation from Melbourne. Having grown up in ‘God’s own country’ both were passionate AFL followers — Clare was an avid North Melbourne supporter having been born in Flemington and Brian a fervent Tiger.

Over the next 60 plus years, Brian and Clare established groups of lifelong friends and a social life for the whole family which revolved around the football and social club.

Clare was proud of her involvement in myriad roles, not the least being a wife and mother of three Ainslie footballers and grandmother of one now playing in the juniors. She was passionate about many things and was not normally backward in coming forward with a view.

Her initial involvement with the club started with fundraising where many a pie was served from her steady hands in the cold canteen in the old wooden shed. Concurrently Clare was assistant coach of the Under 7s and loved this role with Ralph Lewis as coach and mentor. When Ralph retired, Clare was ‘promoted’ to coach and continued in this capacity for a number of years.

Throughout the 70s and 80s, Clare was an avid member of the junior committee going on to become President of the Ainslie juniors, Ainslie delegate on the ACT Junior League Committee and eventually Vice President of the ACT Junior League. She was also a Member on the ACT Junior League Tribunal. She and the many volunteers that helped behind the scenes regularly ran raffles at the club to raise funds for the junior club.

Clare received life membership of both AFL Canberra and the Junior League. She was awarded a NAFC Merit Award for services to Australian Football in 1994 and was patron of the Ainslie juniors.

Clare was a constant and popular personality around the club and was also involved in the Ainslie senior club, and again could be found handing out food, advice (and a piece of her mind if needed or not) in the canteens at Phillip and O’Connor ovals. From 1989 to 1992 Clare served on the senior board and was the first female secretary of the football club from 1991-1992.

On a couple of occasions, she even strapped on the boots for a not always friendly scrap against WAGs from opposing clubs and along with other volunteers was an expert grand final and milestone ‘banner maker’.

Clare loved the club and one of her greatest joys was working with the ‘two Jim’s — Keegan and Backen — as part of the first memorabilia committee which was formed to help display the club’s history as part of its major renovations. Clare and the Jim’s spent innumerable hours squirrelled away under stairs, beneath stages, in basements, storage units and so on and some of the hard work by this dynamic trio will no doubt contribute to the club’s upcoming 100 years celebration. She believed that without a past, a club did not have a future. The club honoured her commitment by naming the memorabilia room at the oval after her.

Clare will be sadly missed but not forgotten. Even though her various illnesses and lack of mobility restricted her involvement in later years, she was still seen at the social club for various Palmer family celebrations and continued to work on the memorabilia committee right up until about 10 years ago.

She received life membership of the AFC in 1986.

Our thoughts are with Brian, Patrick, Susan, Sharon and Sean and their extended families.

A funeral service to celebrate Clare’s life will be held at St Brigid’s Church in Bancroft Street Dickson on 9 January at 1.30pm followed by a wake at the AFC.

For those unable to make the service and would like to view it on line – please find the URL to view – https://attnd.com.au/clare-palmer

“Never faltered, never slackened”