Argue, Graham

BORN IN MELBOURNE IN 1929, he first played senior hockey for the Demons (1948-49) and was a member of the first Australian Ice Hockey Team that defeated the European All-Stars, 4-3 in 1948. He moved to the Blackhawks (1950); the Pirates (1951 to 1952, 1958 to '62 and 1965, '66); returning to the Blackhawks (1967, '68); then the Demons (1978, '79). He won a Goodall Cup with Victoria in 1951 and the next year married a girl he had first met when she was 16.

Pat Longden was a professional figure skater, one of 6 Australian skaters in the Adelaide season of Armand Perren's Ice Follies of 1950 at the Theatre Royal, Adelaide. The pair joined Perren's International Ice Revue touring Australia and New Zealand and performed in Hot Ice in four states in 1953 and 1954, with ice hockey players Jimmy Lawrence and Geoff Thorne. In London they landed parts in White Horse Inn on Ice then skated in the Sonja Henie and Morris Chalfen European Holiday On Ice show touring Europe for three years and South Africa for 6 months.

Back home they raised a family in Elwood. He returned to the Pirates while she skated live on ABC television in Ice Ballets devised by Nancy Burley from 1957 to 1962. In 1970, he and Pat formed the company that built the Olympic Ice Skating Centre in the Melbourne suburb of Oakleigh South. Still operating 47 years later, it was there that his wife directed and choreographed 13 ice revues with world champions such as Donald Jackson, Scott Hamilton, Diane de Leu and casts of two hundred skaters. For ten years they also directed and choreographed a mobile ice show called Moomba, staging ice show promotions at shopping centres Australia-wide, the GMH Motor show in Sydney and Melbourne, the Adelaide Festival Theatre and Perth Entertainment Centre.

They sold their interest in the Oakleigh rink in the mid-80s, and produced ice skating for 3 years at the Melbourne's Sidney Myer Music Bowl for the Victorian Arts Centre. Their productions there included Teddy Bears Picnic on Ice for Free Entertainment in the Parks (FEIP), Rock Concert on Ice for Melbourne City Council, Young Talent Time Christmas Special and the Telecom Media Launch for mobile phones on national television. They also initiated a school teaching program there and a skating school for the Council of Adult Education. They sold the business to the Victorian Arts Centre and operated a rink at Mount Buller for a season.

He played a total of 123 games in the Victorian league and assembled the Demons highly-talented and victorious team of 1977, with club president Alan Price and secretary Otto Wolf. He was also instrumental in the establishment of the Melbourne Nite Owls in the oldtimer's league. He died of a heart attack in 1993 survived by his wife and three children, Greg, David and Michelle. He was awarded Life Membership of the Victorian association in 2015.