KEITH T. DENNETT | New South | CONTACT
In news from the coal-face, a Newcastle man is beginning to join the dots this week as he traces his lineage back to a famous Knight in 1997.
Born on the 24th of June in 1998, Darren Lambton has always thought his entrance into the world seemed a little unplanned, not to mention it was odd that he was one of the last ‘Darrens’ to be born on the east coast of Australia, according to census records.
The son of two proud Novocastrians, Debbie and Shane Lambton, the bricklayer from Newcastle is well aware he was probably an accident, given the timeline of his birth and his parents shotgun wedding only two months before his birth seemed a little rushed.
However this week, as the steel city around him erupts into finals footy fever and every car north of the Hawkesbury Bridge begins to fly red and blue flags, Darren’s realised that his local NRL team might have something to do with the reason why he’s on this earth.
Dropping into his parents home for dinner this week, Darren couldn’t help but raise the topic with his coy parents.
“So you met Dad in 1997?” Darren queried his mother, “but you were dating that whole year right?”
Giving each other an awkward glance across the table, Darren’s dad Shane piped up to try and give a little more context.
“Yeah, your Mother and I ummm… we sort of got together around that time, she was a bartender at the old Ducks Nuts Hotel in town!”
“It was a great time back then, Newcastle was really thriving!” Debbie added.
However, in the midst of all of the nostalgia, one thing that Mum and Dad aren’t making explicitly clear is that Darren was in fact conceived in the back of a Mitsubishi Magna station wagon in the car park of Nobbys Beach a few days after the Knights beat Manly in their first ever Grand Final.
“Yeah and then your brother, Andrew Joseph, came a few years after you in 2002.” said Dad.
“Little ‘Joey’, he was a surprise too!” said Mum.
