Wayne Marjoribanks always knew his dad Horace was a great footy player who nearly signed with the Manly Sea Eagles in the 1950s. 

But he didn’t find out until after Horace passed away that the travelling confectionary salesman was the first Blues captain in what some rugby league historians consider to be the first ever State of Origin game.

What is dubbed Australia’s greatest sporting rivalry had unlikely origins in a Papua New Guinean seaside village at the end of the Second World War.

On September 16, 1945, in the weeks after Japan surrendered but before Australian soldiers returned home, Queensland and New South Wales troops — many of them first-grade footballers — played the first of two rugby league games at Torokina on Bougainville Island.

It was thought to be the first time interstate teams were selected according to birthplace rather than where they lived or enlisted — a unique concept that would not be replicated until State of Origin as we know it began in the 1980s.

Queensland won the series at Torokina’s Medco Oval, two games to nil, and was awarded a trophy made from a 120mm Japanese naval shell.

On Wednesday night at Origin II, that trophy will be displayed at the MCG alongside the State of Origin shield — the first time the NRL has officially recognised the historical significance of the series.

‘Dad would’ve been fairly peeved off’

A match report published in the Rockhampton Morning Bulletin on September 27, 1945, described how the “Bananalanders” smashed through the NSW defence to score 30 seconds before full-time and win the first game 10-9 .

“I have witnessed one of the most spectacular and exciting games of rugby league I have seen,” wrote Warrant Officer Ron Connor.

“The spectators swarmed over the field and [try scorer Hec Bradshaw] was carried shoulder high to the dressing shed.”

Horace Marjoribanks’ children only discovered about a decade ago that their late father, who enlisted in an engineering unit, had captained the losing side.

“Dad didn’t mention anything about Bougainville,” Wayne Marjoribanks said.

“I love it. I love the idea that he could’ve been the first NSW captain and his offsider in Queensland [Jack Barnes] would’ve been the first Queensland captain.

Horace, nicknamed Horrie, played first grade in the Newcastle Rugby League at five-eighth before and after World War II.

Several members of the Marjoribanks clan were talented footballers, most notably Horace’s nephew Bob Banks (shortened from Marjoribanks).

Banks represented Australia in more than a dozen tests from 1953 to 1962 and ironically his adopted state Queensland more than 20 times prior to Origin.

Horace was a salesman for MacRobertson’s, the original maker of Freddo frogs and Cherry Ripes, and was offered a contract by the Manly Sea Eagles in 1950, according to son, Wayne.

“It was six games with an option for the next year at 50 pounds a game,” he said.

“Dad knocked it back because Mum and Dad had just bought the new home in Adamstown [Newcastle] and wanted to stay there and probably also didn’t want to go down to the big smoke in Sydney.”

The quiet bloke who helmed the ‘Bananalanders’

Maroons captain Jack Barnes was an electrical linesman who not only played first-grade footy in Rockhampton but was also a talented cricketer who represented Queensland in a Sheffield Shield match in 1941 before he was drafted.

“He was a pretty quiet sort of a man. Loved his football, loved his cricket,” son John Barnes said.

“After he retired from the sporting scene he was always an avid football watcher and cricket watcher.”

John said his father didn’t say much about the war but another inter-military rugby league trophy — won by a field ambulance side Jack led in 1943 — ended up at the family home for many years before it was given to the RSL.

“It was made out of a mortar shell with machine gun bullets as handles. It was pretty well-made for something that was knocked up in a wartime engineering shop somewhere,” John Barnes said.

He said Jack, who played fullback, was a Broncos supporter until he died in 2011, and that his descendants were still “well and truly” Maroons supporters.

“That never changes does it? That’s part of the blood,” John said.

“My brother and myself, we both played rugby league, all my grandchildren play rugby league … we’ve all been avid bloody rugby league players for sure.

Origin restores ‘sense of justice’ for Queenslanders

Greg Shannon from the Queensland Rugby League history committee said with an eighth of the Australian population serving in the military during WWII, many well-known sportsmen ended up in uniform.

Kelly Brennan, Eric Bowe and Doug McRitchie were among those who played at Bougainville and also represented state and national rugby league sides.

After the war, interstate games continued to be played based on where players lived, which Mr Shannon said gave NSW an unfair advantage.

“Particularly in the 1960s and 70s, Queensland players went to Sydney in droves because that’s where the big money was, so often we struggled to keep the same side every year,” he said.

“As a [Queensland] kid growing up in the 1970s it used to drive you nuts. We had good players but we’d lose them and then they’d come back in a blue jersey. It was awful … We didn’t win a series for 21 years.

Historic Bougainville games figure in PNG NRL deal bid

The Bougainville games are being recognised by the NRL as it closes in on a deal with the federal government worth up to $600 million over 10 years to secure a PNG-based side.

Rugby league is considered PNG’s national sport and an important diplomatic tool for Australia as China moves to grow its influence in the Pacific.

Minister for International Development and the Pacific, Pat Conroy, pushed to publicise the WWII-era games but denied it was a strategic move ahead of an announcement on an 18th NRL franchise.

“I thought this was a brilliant story and more Australians needed to know about this,” he said.

“I think they’re unrelated in that one’s a historical event and one’s prospective negotiations but one of the reasons we are keen to support a PNG team entering the NRL is the strong and enduring sporting ties, particularly rugby league, between our two nations.”