The rugby league player

Albert - Bert - Henry Baskerville - also spelled Baskiville - was a rugby player - and a damned good one but what he is really known for is organising the first rugby league team in the country.
Bert was born on January 15, 1883, in Masterton to Henry William and his wife Maria.
The family moved around quite a bit - nearly everyone of his brothers and sister was born in a different New Zealand town, but by the time he was 20 the family was settled in Auckland.
It was also where Bert lost his father. Henry was killed in an accident on January 30,1903, while doing some drainage works on Upper Queen Street in Auckland.
He and some other workmen were working in a deep excavation when one side of it began to collapse, men called out but his father moved the wrong way and was buried to his neck. He was quickly removed but his injuries were too serious to survive.
Bert - who was a postal clerk - moved his family to Wellington where he became the main income earner.
He played rugby for the Wellington club in 1903 then switched to the Oriental Club where he played regularly.
He published his book Modern Rugby Football: Modern New Zealand Methods; Points for the Beginner, the Player, the Spectator, in 1907 which started his national profile.
He turned his attention to his next ambition, a professional tour of Great Britain.
Along with rugby he was also a short and middle distance runner and often competed for money, along with ideas for inventions, filing a patent for a "cuff protector and blotter".
He became intrigued by the breakaway sport played by the Northern Union in England - which played what would become rugby league - asking for it to host a tour of New Zealand rugby players and when it was agreed he left his job in the Postal Department to organise it full time.
However the Wellington Rugby Union moved quickly to attempt to stop him from attending its grounds and he received a life ban from the New Zealand Rugby Union.
He still managed to put together an impressive touring party that included eight All Blacks, including four from the 1905 tour of Great Britain.
The tour was a great success although Bert only managed to play one game, so busy was he with the administration of the tour.
Then on arriving in Australia he played in the first ever trans-Tasman test which was the first match by the Australia national rugby league team, again scoring a try. That was to be the only time that Baskerville represented New Zealand in a test match.
On the trip home he contracted pneumonia on the ship and died in Brisbane on May 20, 1908.
He is buried in Karori Cemetery.​