This is one of a series of articles from the Western mail on star W.A.F.L. players
Full name Kenneth Roy Eli Caporn Nickname Moose
Born 12 September 1927
Senior clubs: Claremont Played 1943 – 1958 Games 273 Goals 41
Kenneth Caporn began his Claremont career in 1943, when the WANFL was operating as an under-age competition only. He went on to play a total of 273 games for the club before hanging up his boots at the end of the 1958 season. He also played a dozen interstate matches for Western Australia.
Powerful, tenacious and extraordinarily fit, Caporn played as a ruckman for many years before developing into one of the finest post-war full backs in West Australian football, and arguably the best ever to take the field for the Monts, winning the club’s fairest and best trophy in 1951 and 1954. By the later years of his career he had developed his physique to Herculean proportions, and was rewarded by his team mates with the nickname ‘Moose’ – with painful consequences for one of his team mates, diminutive rover Bruce Sinclair:
Late in one match, Bruce was running back to take a mark on the guidance of one of his team mates’ call of “Yours Bruce!” Unfortunately the call was really “Yours Moose!” The result of this small breakdown in communication was a somewhat large breakdown in Bruce’s capacity to play for the rest of the game. When he came to some time later he expressed the opinion that Ken’s nickname might be changed for the general health of his team mates.¹
Despite playing alongside such high quality footballers as Les McClements, Bill O’Neill and Gordon ‘Sonny’ Maffina for much of his career, Ken Caporn never experienced the satisfaction of playing in a premiership team, or indeed even went close to so doing.
Author – John Devaney
