The great Pinetree Meads was snubbed by his own

The Meads snub story was a biggie at the time.

Famous Sydney rugby league coach Jack Gibson once told me there’s no point in being a life member of a dead club.

At the time he visited Palmerston North, Gibson was a lifer of the defunct Sydney outfit, Newtown, although that club did rise from the dead in 1990.

In 1983, Colin Meads, 26 years before he he became a knight companion in 2009, must have wondered if his King Country rugby community had gone brain dead.

I have never attended an annual meeting where the lifemember nominee had been embarrassingly turned down. But in King Country that evening, Pinetree’s nomination was rejected and let’s say he was displeased.

Meads had heard only the previous day that his Waitete club had put his name up and said afterwards most people take it for granted when they are nominated. ‘‘Well, on this occasion it didn’t and the message is, ‘never take anything for granted’.’’

Even then ‘Tree was the union’s greatest son.

Rugby Museum director Stephen Berg sounded the klaxon recently when one of his staff stumbled on a report on the incident while checking they had a complete set of Rugby Newsweeklies.

The Museum has two complete sets of the sadly now deceased Rugby News, one donated by TV commentator Keith Quinn, who had to downsize when he shifted houses in Wellington.

This article stuck out like a Meads thumb, unbylined and running on the front page, especially considering the late Pinetree now has a statue in Te Kuiti and almost every other honour known to rugby.

At the time of his King Country rejection, it was put about that an anonymous King Country bloke had been spreading ‘‘malicious untruths’’ that had influenced a few delegates to vote against him.

Rugby News reported Meads’ reaction at the time: ‘‘Once I’d recovered from the shock of what had happened, other people got far more upset about the issue than I did.’’

Another rumour had been spread that if Meads was made a life member, his services would no longer be available to the union. It was later revealed in Brian Turner’s book Meads that came from the union chairman.

But after chatting to Meads’ former All Black brother Stan last week, it seems both accusations were probably smokescreens for public consumption.

It seems Colin had clashed with some sub-union delegates on the union and two or three held a snitcher against him.

In those days, King Country was made up of sub-unions, and one of them, believed to be Otorohanga, put the skids under the legend, safe in the knowledge they didn’t have to face his fist in a lineout. Over time, the sub-unions melted away.

A board came into being and in the late 1990s Meads at last became a life member, only after warning the union he didn’t want a repeat of the 1983 fiasco. Mind you, it took an unusual length of time for him to become a New Zealand Rugby Union life member (2007) and honoured in various world halls of fame, probably because, as he said, he was a bit rougher than most rugby knights.

The Meads snub story was a biggie at the time and provoked nationwide reaction.

He went on to become King Country chairman, but was dumped from the All Blacks’ selection panel in 1986 after managing the Cavaliers in South Africa. Each time he bounced back from these political setbacks, to serve on the NZ Rugby Union council in 1992 and as All Blacks’ manager.

Perhaps when King Country confers life memberships, they should mean later-in-life memberships – a few smallminded delegates felt Meads was too young the first time he was nominated.

Stan Meads, who turns 80 next year and who coached King Country after a mid-season players revolt, received his life badge only four years ago. ‘‘I didn’t really want it,’’ he said.

These days he farms a small 12-hectare block near Te Kuiti.

Stan preferred family and farming, as in 1967, when farming in partnership with their parents at a busy time of year, he withdrew from selection from the 1967 All Blacks tour to Britain that gave Manawatu¯ lock Sam Strahan his big chance.

Meanwhile, Stan doesn’t subscribe to the view players of his era wouldn’t have been up to it physically with today’s professionals.

They were lean from farm work back then and had they hit the gyms, as they do today, could easily have bulked up.

Members of the wider Meads family inhabit Manawatı¯ and have Rangitı¯kei origins. Their grandfather was born at Tutaenui, near Marton, and their father Vere in Hunterville.

Had he not moved from Kimbolton to Putaruru in 1933, the brothers might have been illustrious players for Manawatu¯ .

The Meads name was on the honours board of the Rangiwahia Rugby Club in the 1900s and Meads men played for Kimbolton and Kia Toa before World War I.