Grahame Morris Budge (7 November 1920 - 14 November 1979) was a

Scotland Scotland (, ) is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. Covering the northern third of the island of Great Britain, mainland Scotland has a Anglo-Scottish border, border with England to the southeast ...

rugby player. He played four times for Scotland and once for the British Isles against

New Zealand New Zealand ( mi, Aotearoa ) is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and over 700 smaller islands. It is the sixth-largest island count ...

Career

He played for various clubs, which included Dunbar RFC, where the club's historian, from a later generation, would record him as being a local lad who played for Dunbar RFC both before and after the Second World War before moving on to play for

Edinburgh Wanderers Edinburgh Wanderers is a former rugby union club, founded in 1868. It was latterly a tenant of the Scottish Rugby Union, playing home fixtures at Murrayfield Stadium for nearly 75 years. In 1997 it merged with Murrayfield RFC to form Murrayfie ...

, later still

and finally he was called up for the British Lions in the same year as for Scotland, in 1950. This tour was notable for being the first of the

British and Irish Lions The British & Irish Lions is a rugby union team selected from players eligible for the national teams of England, Ireland, Scotland, and Wales. The Lions are a test side and most often select players who have already played for their national ...

tours to occur after

The Second World War World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...

(the previous tour was in 1938) and the first in which the British and Irish visitors wore red. For around 30 years the standard shirt was a now relatively unfamiliar but then famous navy blue design. Budge was not unique in being an individual who played for a Canadian club and the Lions. As an aside, in his case at one point he played for the British Columbia Bears, sometimes known as the

BC Bears The British Columbia Bears (formerly Pacific Tyee) are the senior men's representative rugby team for British Columbia. They were founded in 2009 to compete in the Americas Rugby Championship against other representative teams from Canada, Argenti ...

. Rather, three other players also fulfill this criteria. None of these men played for Wales or Ireland, but two played for Scotland at international level and the other two for England, before they all played for the Lions. Budge was unique, however, in having played for the Lions and having been born in

Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tot ...

Family

His granddaughter,

Alison Christie Alison may refer to: People * Alison (given name), including a list of people with the name * Alison (surname) Music * ''Alison'' (album), aka ''Excuse Me'', a 1975 album by Australian singer Alison MacCallum * "Alison" (song), song by El ...

, played 61 times for Scotland between 1994 and 2004

References

1920 births 1979 deaths British & Irish Lions rugby union players from Canada British & Irish Lions rugby union players from Scotland Canadian expatriate rugby union players Canadian expatriate sportspeople in Scotland Canadian people of Scottish descent Canadian rugby union players Edinburgh Wanderers RFC players Expatriate rugby union players in Scotland People from Westman Region, Manitoba Scotland international rugby union players Scottish rugby union players Sportspeople from Manitoba {{Scotland-rugbyunion-bio-stub