Le Brun was one of only 24 players in the history of the game to have played with four VFL-AFL clubs. Three other footballers hold the record of playing with five clubs. But leaving aside the oddity attached to Le Brun's name in the footy history books, his contribution to the game, to Collingwood, and to his country has been sadly neglected over the years.
Le Brun should be recalled for two key reasons other than the fact that he played 50 games with four different clubs - three with South Melbourne (1929); 23 with Essendon (1931-32); 19 games with Collingwood (1933-34) and five games with Carlton (1935).
For a start, the AFL recognises him as the first known player of an indigenous heritage to have represented the Collingwood Football Club. That in itself should be celebrated as he unwittingly paved a pathway that sees Andrew Krakouer, Sharrod Wellingham, Peter Yagmoor and Kirk Ugle as current indigenous Magpies.
But, as we approach Anzac Day, it is more poignant to remember that Le Brun made the ultimate sacrifice on a very different field. He was the 10th - and last - Collingwood footballer to be killed as a result of war.
Collingwood lost eight players and former players in the First World War, with one of them, Alan Cordner (20 games, 1913-14), dying on the first day of the Gallipoli landings on April 25, 1915 - just three days after a young Norm Le Brun enjoyed his seventh birthday.
The others killed were Sam Campbell (1 game, 1910), Fred Fielding (17 games, 1913), Charles Langtree (1 game, 1900), Peter Martin (15 games, 1901-02), Percy Rowe, who played under the name of 'Paddy Rowan' (82 games, 1911-15), Tom Worle (3 games, 1907) and Tom Wright (12 games, 1906-07).
The Second World War saw Magpie players and past players enlist in even greater numbers as the theatres of war came to Australia's doorstop.
Norm Oliver, who played 13 games with Collingwood from 1940-41, was killed when his Kittyhawk crashed near Madang in New Guinea on June 27, 1944.
And five months later, Le Brun also was killed in New Guinea, making him the last of the Magpies lost in war.
So what do we know about Le Brun the footballer? Not a huge amount other than the fact that he must have been a talented player to have broken into the Collingwood team during the 1933-34 seasons.
It was a time when legendary coach Jock McHale was trying to mix the remnants of the 'Machine' side that won four straight flags from 1927-30 with a host of young players. The result would be premierships in 1935-36, but in keeping with his footy wanderlust, Le Brun had already left Victoria Park by that stage.
Norman Stanley Le Brun was born at Sorrento on April 22, 1908. As documented in the book Fallen, the Footballers who never returned from war, written by Jim Main and David Allen, he could well have played for five VFL clubs as he played with Richmond seconds but could not muster a senior game.
The 171cm, 72kg rover/forward made his VFL for South Melbourne in 1929, kicking two goals in his first game, but managed only three matches before heading to Sandhurst the following year, where he was the equal winner of the Bendigo Football League best and fairest award.
Such was his form that Le Brun won another VFL chance, and he played 23 games for Essendon in 1931-32.
History doesn't recall how Le Brun came to Collingwood, though it is known that he was performing well in the seconds side under McHale's much respected understudy Hugh Thomas before being selected for his first game in black and white. There were no headlines when the player who is now considered Collingwood's first known player with an indigenous background ran out for the Round 3 game against South Melbourne in 1933.
Then 25, Le Brun played two games that season with limited impact, before being relegated to the seconds again.
But he began to make his biggest impact at Collingwood in the 1934 season. He became a more settled member of a side that had many club greats in it, including Syd and Gordon Coventry, Harry and Albert Collier, Jack Regan, Charlie Dibbs, Harold Rumney and Phonse Kyne.
Acting as a second rover to Harry Collier, and a handy player around the goals, Le Brun played 17 games and kicked 23 goals for the season. At one stage of the season, the Argus called him: "the most improved man in the side."
On three occasions that season he kicked three goals in a game, including in a thrilling draw with Geelong, and his season tally was fourth at the club behind Gordon Coventry (105), Phonse Kyne (29) and Harry Collier (25).
The biggest headlines Le Brun was ever a part of came from a game that contained the "most disgraceful scene(s) in the history of the game." In one of the most brutal Collingwood and Carlton contests, Syd Coventry suffered a serious head injury after being hit by Gordon Mackie, and Norm Le Brun copped some punishment from Harold Maskell after taking a mark.
Umpire Bob Scott claimed that Maskell had jabbed Le Brun "with closed fists on each of his ribs." But in keeping with the code of not dobbing on an opponent, Le Brun denied that Maskell had deliberately punched him. He said: "We are all keen on the game, and all felt hot and bothered, but I only felt a hit on the shoulder. He was trying to knock the ball out of my hand."
Le Brun's last game for Collingwood came in the 1934 semi-final against South Melbourne. It was his only VFL final, but the Magpies lost.
Incredibly, Le Brun ended up at Carlton the following season, the side that had handed out such a physical battering a year earlier. But that wasn't the end of his club swapping. He spent time at Coburg, South Warrnambool, and was even appointed coach of Ulverstone at one stage.
Le Brun remained playing well into his 30s. Not even the Second World War stopped him. A single man, he enlisted on February 26, 1942 - a week after the bombing of Darwin - but kept playing football in the services.
An Argus reporter gave a glimpse of how members of the forces in far northern Australia maintained their fitness in April 1943. He wrote: "In this part of the world, where climate varies only from wet to dry, all forms of sport flourish and die together." The great Albert Collier and Norm Le Brun were among them.
Trooper Le Brun transferred to an elite 2/6th Australian Commando Squadron, which sailed from Townsville on the HMAS Katoomba to New Guinea. He was to serve as part of the units sent to northern New Guinea in an effort to drive the retreating Japanese out.
According to a book, To The Green Field Beyond, by Shaun O'Leary, Le Brun was the first Australian soldier to die in what would become known as the Aitape-Wewak campaign - a campaign that was seen at the time as a "mopping up exercise" in purging the Japanese from New Guinea.
The book said: "On November 15 (1944) the squadron suffered the 6th Division's first battle casualty in New Guinea ... the going was heavy, the maps inadequate, and there was an absence of tracks, so the patrol was constantly bashing its way through. At 1pm it sighted four Japanese across the river and killed one of them. At 2.30pm it wounded another who succeeded in escaping. At 4pm a party of Japanese was seen near the native huts, all of them carrying carbines."
"This force was engaged in a fire fight, which lasted three quarters of an hour, in the course of which Trooper N.S. Le Brun was killed by a rifleman concealed among the root of a large tree. The country was too steep and the jungle too thick for the patrol to bring Le Brun's body back."
He was buried a few hundreds metres from where he fell. Later, his body was moved to Aitapi before he was eventually laid to rest in the Lae War Cemetry. He was only 36.
One of his close friends, Norm Odlum, was quoted in the book Fallen as saying: "Everyone had the greatest respect for him and although he was older than most of us, he mixed in well, and I never heard anyone say a word against him."
In May 1945, six months after Le Brun's death, an article in the Argus revealed how the Australians had re-named the area in which he had fallen after him. It said: "In the Aitape sector is the Le Brun feature, a steep hill on the Danmap River and known simply as Le Brun. It is named after the first Australian killed in the area, Norman Le Brun, trooper in a Calvary Commando squadron and a well-known Victorian footballer."
That's how Norman Le Brun should be remembered, not just as someone who happened to play for four VFL clubs, Collingwood among them.
Glenn McFarlane is a senior football journalist with the Herald Sun and has written several books on Collingwood's history
