On the night of Saturday 26 September, 1987, his beloved Blues having just knocked Hawthorn over on what was then the hottest Grand Final day on record, lifelong Carlton supporter Dave Christopher followed his old mate John Feder from the MCG to what was then The Australian newspaper’s Melbourne bureau in Flinders Street.

Filing through the main doors of the five-storey building, the pair made a beeline for the darkroom, where Christopher pulled up a pew and watched on as Feder, a professional sports photographer of renown, developed his game-day prints for publication in the national broadsheet’s next edition.

“I remember seeing John pouring over all of these photos and selecting a few for the editor to decide which of them was going to get a run in the paper,” Christopher recalled.

“He was discarding a lot of photos which either had faults in them or just weren’t quite good enough, but as quickly as he was chucking them in the bin, I was there retrieving them.”

Into Christopher’s kit bag went glorious black-and-white images captured by Feder’s trusty lens – a front-on pic of Paul Meldrum leading Gary Ayres in hot pursuit of the Sherrin, an elated David Glascott moments after earning his third premiership medallion, an exhausted Adrian Gleeson hoisting the silverware skyward on his MCG victory lap, and the triumphant Carlton captain Stephen Kernahan following suit whilst straddling the shoulders of Harry Dean’s old man Peter.

For Christopher, the photographs for years served as exquisite reminders of what he’d just seen from the terraces, again courtesy of his good mate the snapper.

“John managed to snag a ticket for me to that game,” Christopher remembered. “There were other games in other times where he’d throw me a camera, we’d walk onto the ground together and I’d take a few snaps of the action myself. But this was a Grand Final and I didn’t have any accreditation, so I watched on from ground level in one of the stands.

“I was always a fan of the midfielders, the likes of Glascott and Gleeson were the types of players I watched the most, and their photos are probably the ones I most prized.”

Christopher identified a handful of images as keepsakes, some of which he framed for display in his house a short tram trip from the old Carlton ground.

“I had the photos hanging in my house for a long, long time, but as you do, I took them down and stored them in a plastic container away in the shed,” Christopher explained.

“Over the years I’ve looked at them from time to time, but I came to the point where I thought: ‘Well I’m a lifetime Carlton supporter and I live down the road from the old ground, so it might be time that these photos were handed over to the Club or to the actual Carlton players who played on that day.”

Last week, Glascott was the first to be presented with his photograph by Christopher, which captures him experiencing the sheer elation of Grand Final victory. He recalled another being taken moments before when the then Australian Prime Minister, the late Bob Hawke hung the medal around his neck.

“I’m very thankful to Dave, it’s just good to get that photo,” Glascott said. “The picture shows great euphoria and a big smile after a lot of hard work - and I was very dehydrated because that was a 31-degree day: we were less conscious of rehydration back then, and it was head down, bum up.

“I’d been there for the premierships of 1981 and ’82 and the period that followed when we weren’t competing, but by the time ’87 rolled around I was a leader and one of only three with Kenny (Hunter) and ‘Johnno’ (Wayne Johnston) who’d also been part of the back-to-back premierships - so that one probably meant more to me.”

It pleases Christopher no end that the likes of Glascott, Gleeson and Kernahan have accepted his offer of the Feder photographs – frozen moments in time which so splendidly capture his Carlton heroes at a high point in their football lives.

Of the actual presentation of the photo to Glascott in person, Christopher considered the moment “a genuine highlight”.

“It was fantastic to actually meet David in these circumstances,” Christopher said.

“He and I were both 26 in 1987, so it sounds weird that I idolised a player the same age, but I actually idolised him because of his speed and the way he played. He was a skinny runt who’d already been part of two premierships, and in ’87 he ran hard on what was a really hot Grand Final day.

“David is a lovely bloke who’s still involved with the Club through the Spirit of Carlton. Meeting him has definitely been a highlight for me.”