Ned Gregory And The Sydney Cricket Ground

This photograph of Charles, David and Ned Gregory was reportedly taken after the Inter-Colonial Single Wicket competition of 1871.

Ned Gregory was a professional cricketer and member of an Australian cricket dynasty. He played for Australia in the first Test at the MCG - his brother Dave Gregory was captain, two other brothers played for NSW, two of his sons played for NSW (one being the Test cricketer Syd Gregory) and his nephew Jack Gregory also represented Australia.

Although familiar with the grounds as a player, it was Gregory’s work as caretaker of the Military and Civil Ground and later first curator of the Association Ground and SCG where he made his most significant contributions to cricket.
In the 1860s Gregory became caretaker and his wife Ellen a charwoman or cleaner, at the grounds. They lived on-site in the stone caretaker’s cottage, where their son Syd was born in 1870.

Under the management of the Cricket Association and the Sydney Cricket and Sports Groundsees Gregory experimented with and laid the first Bulli soil wicket at the grounds in 1888. In 1896, he designed and constructed the first mechanically adjustable scoreboard on the Hill.

Gregory died in 1899 in the brick cottage that had replaced the original stone caretaker’s cottage.