And both had visionary grandmothers who, more than a century ago, laid the foundations of netball in New Zealand.<\/p>\n
Those two women \u2013 Irene McInnes and Myrtle Muir \u2013 were posthumously inducted into the Netball New Zealand Hall of Fame before the first test of the Constellation Cup in Auckland on Sunday.<\/p>\n
Jackson and McCarthy knew little of their grandmothers\u2019 achievements until a couple of years ago. Now they are proud custodians of their legacy, receiving the Hall of Fame gold pins in their honour. And now, like their grandmothers, they\u2019ve become firm friends.<\/p>\n
They live at opposite ends of the North Island \u2013 Jackson, granddaughter of McInnes, in Paremata, north of Wellington; McCarthy, Muir\u2019s granddaughter, in the Northland town of Waipu.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut it doesn\u2019t make a difference when I see her, it\u2019s like we\u2019ve known each other forever, really,\u201d McCarthy says.<\/p>\n
Marcella McCarthy (left) and Jocelyn Jackson. Photo \/ Michael Bradley Photography<\/p>\n
The pair were first brought together during Netball New Zealand\u2019s centenary in 2024 by Dr Margaret Henley, a passionate netball researcher and archivist.<\/p>\n
The university lecturer had discovered Mrs H.D. Muir \u2013 Myrtle \u2013 coached the original Silver Ferns side in 1938. She also found that Muir played a key role in establishing the New Zealand Basket Ball Association after Mrs R.S. McInnes \u2013 Irene \u2013 called a meeting at her Wellington home in 1924.<\/p>\n
McInnes became the first president of the NZBBA, later known as Netball New Zealand, with Muir her vice-president.<\/p>\n
Both women were forces of nature, Henley says \u2013 volunteers who kept the sport alive during the Depression and a world war.<\/p>\n
\u201cJocelyn and I were laughing about how these two women went outside the home and took up management roles contra to conventional gender expectations of the time,\u201d she says. \u201cBoth their husbands adored them and respected what they achieved out in the community.\u201d<\/p>\n
Jackson had no idea how much her \u201cNanny\u201d McInnes had done for netball until Henley got in touch.<\/p>\n
She remembers her as a terrifying driver, swooping her Vauxhall Velox straight out of the driveway on her way to the Hataitai netball courts without a second look, but also a generous woman \u201cwho always brought us boiled sweets like Blackpool rock from her many trips away\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cNanny was way ahead of her time. She and her friend were among the first women to cycle the South Island, yet she was always smoking cigarillos. Her father was a furrier, so it wasn\u2019t unusual to see her sporting a fur,\u201d Jackson says.<\/p>\n
\u201cShe owned a bookshop in Newtown, and I\u2019d go there after school to sort the magazine orders. She loved bagpipes and westerns and going to Susy\u2019s Coffee Lounge, which was very cool in the 1960s.<\/p>\n
\u201cOh, and she played hockey as a girl \u2013 not netball.\u201d<\/p>\n
McInnes was deeply committed to her community. She opened her home to unmarried mothers going through difficult times, was heavily involved in the Girl Guides movement \u2013 particularly with girls with disabilities \u2013 and was instrumental in the Gold Star Mother\u2019s Club, which supported women who\u2019d lost sons at war.<\/p>\n
That cause was deeply personal. Her own son Paul was killed at Monte Cassino during World War II.<\/p>\n
McInnes grew up in Dunedin, where her father, Robert Sheriff Black, was an exporter of frozen rabbits and furs, and the city\u2019s mayor.<\/p>\n
A maths and science teacher, she was an active member of the Dunedin YWCA \u2013 where she got involved in basketball. It\u2019s believed to be where she first met Myrtle Muir, who was in the Christchurch branch.<\/p>\n
Three of the pioneers uniting netball in New Zealand (from left) Irene McInnes, Myrtle Muir and Betty Armstrong. Photo \/ Netball NZ<\/p>\n
After marrying Ralph McInnes, Irene responded to calls from around the country to create a national organisation and address the urgent need for a single set of rules to unify the game.<\/p>\n
So she invited representatives of the five centres playing basketball to a meeting at her home in Kilbirnie. Muir was among those who attended and voted to establish the New Zealand Basket Ball Association. It was the first national netball association in the world, and the only sports body in New Zealand run exclusively by women.<\/p>\n
Henley says McInnes was the obvious choice as president, and Muir, seven years her junior, was elected vice-president. McInnes modestly joked: \u201cThey couldn\u2019t do anything else \u2013 the meeting was in my house\u201d.<\/p>\n
Both women were also umpires, and travelled the country together encouraging the growth of the game. In 1925, McInnes told the Wairarapa Age that outdoor basketball was \u201cbetter than any other for girls and young women, especially those engaged in offices and factories who have not much opportunity in keeping themselves in hard physical form\u201d.<\/p>\n
When McInnes handed the national presidency to Muir in 1932, she became the sport\u2019s first life member in recognition of her vision and leadership. Six years later, she was appointed to the newly formed National Council of Physical Welfare and Recreation \u2013 the forerunner of Sport New Zealand. She died in 1969, aged 76.<\/p>\n
Myrtle Muir (in front of life buoy) with the 1938 Silver Ferns on board the MV Wanganella. Photo \/ Netball NZ<\/p>\n
Muir was renowned as an excellent organiser, leading the New Zealand Basketball Association for 21 years. She also coached the first Silver Ferns team, captained by Meg Matangi, in four test losses to Australia. Not that they weren\u2019t skilled: New Zealand played a nine-a-side game, but had to play to the unfamiliar seven-a-side rules the Australians played.<\/p>\n
She pushed for New Zealand to adopt the seven-a-side rules and even tried to get the name basketball changed to netball to get in line with the international game, but that didn\u2019t happen until 1970.<\/p>\n
McCarthy remembers spending some school holidays with Muir, her \u201cGran\u201d, in Wellington. She\u2019d visit her grandmother\u2019s office in the Town Hall, where Muir was secretary-manager for The Smith Family children\u2019s charity, supporting families in hardship. She was a volunteer for numerous organisations.<\/p>\n
Netball NZ pioneer grandmothers, Irene McInnes and Myrtle Muir. Photo \/ Netball NZ<\/p>\n
Her enduring memory of her grandmother was \u201cher immense kindness, her lovely smiles and her quiet strength and dignity \u2026 She was always helping people\u201d. Muir died of a heart attack in 1966, aged 65.<\/p>\n
Henley\u2019s research helped Muir\u2019s two grandchildren uncover their family\u2019s Chinese heritage, tracing their ancestry to Muir\u2019s grandfather, Wong See Que, a digger in the Central Otago goldfields in the 1860s.<\/p>\n
Three former Silver Ferns who went on to coach the national team \u2013 Yvonne Willering, Leigh Gibbs and Wai Taumaunu \u2013 were also inducted into the Hall of Fame in Auckland on Sunday, before the Silver Ferns beat Australia, 56-50, in the first Constellation Cup match.<\/p>\n
Three generations of Irene McInnes\u2019 family were at the induction, including her great-great-granddaughter Hera Wiren, who continues the family\u2019s unbroken line of netballers.<\/p>\n
\u201cNetball is part of our culture, isn\u2019t it?\u201d says Jackson. \u201cAll the girls in the family \u2013 apart from two who live in America \u2013 have played netball. Let\u2019s just hope that carries on.\u201d<\/p>\n
McCarthy is \u201creally working on\u201d her 8-year-old granddaughter, Sadie, to encourage her to play the game, too. In 2024, Sadie did the coin toss for a Constellation Cup test in Auckland.<\/p>\n
\u201cShe\u2019s still got the game ball \u2013 it\u2019s her most prized possession,\u201d McCarthy says. \u201cShe\u2019s getting taller and has very long legs, so I\u2019m hoping. But she lives in Australia, so that could be a dilemma.\u201d<\/p>\n