WHAT THE WORLD WAS LIKE LAST TIME CATS WERE CHAMPIONS
Ah, 2011. It was a simpler time when we could gather together and attend football games and we went up as one when Geelong won the flag.
But who was in charge of our fair city, what where the big local stories and what else was going on around the world?
IN GEELONG
GEELONG had a population of 177,000 — a figure that has since exploded by 45 per cent to be upwards of 260,000. We were still a year from Armstrong Creek being gazetted.
John Mitchell was in his first and only stint as Geelong mayor.
The football community mourned the passing of Bob Davis, no doubt part of the inspiration for the “too old and slow” Cats to go on and claim the flag.
Fraudster Graeme Hoy was handed his punishment for the Chartwell Enterprises fiasco.
His role in masterminding the Ponzi scheme earned him a 13year jail sentence.
Flash flooding gripped the city in January and caused the Barwon and Leigh rivers to break their banks.
Dunaden won the Geelong Cup, and duly went on to win the Melbourne Cup. Gary Ablett (right) was playing for Gold
Coast.
THE REST OF THE COUNTRY
MOST Australians remember 2011 for flooding.
It was Victoria’s 12th wettest year in 112 years of records. Queensland copped the brunt of the bad weather and subsequent deaths with the worst flooding in more than a century, followed by the worst cyclone in history, Cyclone Yasi. Elsewhere, AFL manager Ricky Nixon was in the headlines for all the wrong reasons over an affair with Kym Duthie, the schoolgirl who published nude photos of players from St Kilda on her Facebook page.
In politics Victoria had a Liberal Premier in Ted Baillieu and Australia a Labor PM in Julia Gillard (below).
And in a spooky similarity to today, Q Qantas briefly grounded its fleet. However, it was only for three days and was caused by industrial action. Australia lost the home Ashes 1-3 to England, leading to Ricky Ponting handing over the captaincy reins to Michael Clarke.
POP CULTURE TRENDS AND TALKING POINTS
FACEBOOK basically had a social media monopoly. But it all changed when Twitter evolved into what we know it today with pictures and videos. Snapchat arrived on our latest device — the iPhone 4 — in time for people to show off their planking skills (including on the Geelong Planking Facebook page).
The world mourned Amy Winehouse as she joined the “27 Club” and, similarly, fans of the Harry Potter films said goodbye to the series with Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2.
WORLD HEADLINES
ONE of our local heroes was the talk of the cycling world, with Cadel Evans becoming the first Australian to win the Tour de France.
Aussie tennis star Sam Stosur won the US Open, and Sally Pearson was named World Athlete of the Year.
A royal wedding captured everyone’s attention as Prince William married Kate Middleton while our Aussie royal — Princess Mary of Denmark — gave birth to twins.
Al-Qa’ida leader Osama bin Laden was killed in Pakistan. A 6.3 magnitude earthquake struck Christchurch with an epicentre less than 7km from the city centre.
It was deemed an aftershock of a series of quakes that started in 2010 and was one of the country’s deadliest disasters, killing 185 people.