Researching Bob Scott

Scott umpired irregularly until the 1929 season during which he became an automatic weekly selection, and remained so until he retired. He holds the record of seven successive VFL Grand Finals (1929–1935) as field umpire. He umpired a total of 157 VFL games during his career from 1921–1935, including 19 Finals games.

Scott was inducted to the Australian Football Hall of Fame in 1996.

Scott was born in Maitland and attended Maitland Boys' High School and Morpeth Grammar School. He subsequently became a dairy farmer and salesman with Shortland City Council, before directing a small family company in the area. A member of the Liberal Party, he contested the 1965 and 1968 elections for Gloucester as an, where the Coalition agreement prevented the Liberal Party from endorsing a candidate against the sitting member.

In 1974, Scott was elected to the New South Wales Legislative Council, filling a casual vacancy caused by the death of independent MLC Harry Gardiner. He served until the 1978 state election, when the reduction in the Council's size led him to lose his place on the Coalition's ticket. In the 1988 state election, he was the Liberal candidate for Port Stephens, losing to Labor candidate Bob Martin by 90 votes. Martin had handed government cheques to community groups during the campaign and Scott filed a petition in the Court of Disputed Returns. Justice Needham held that Martin's conduct amounted to electoral bribery and declared the election void, a result which surprised political observers and politicians. In the subsequent by-election, Martin resoundingly defeated Scott, who has not returned to politics.

He was born in Gordonvale to Robert William Scott and Ina Mary, née McClosky. After attending local state schools he studied for an Associate Diploma in electrical engineering at the Queensland Institute of Technology. As an electrical engineer he worked with the North Queensland Electricity Board in Cairns and Giru. A member of the Labor Party, he was elected to the Queensland Legislative Assembly in 1977 as the member for Cook. From 1983 he was Opposition Spokesman on Northern Development and Aboriginal and Island Affairs, stepping down in 1986. He retired from politics in 1989, and died in Caboolture in 2011.