Tommy Aitchison will always regard the late Australian cricketer Sir Donald Bradman as one of his good friends...even though the pair never met face to face.

And the dozens of letters Mr. Aitchison has kept from years of corresponding with `The Don' is proof that he knew the Australian more than just casually.

"I don't know how he found the time to write to somebody like me but he did," said Aitchison, who showed a pile of letters collected over the years. Some were typed, others handwritten, but all are precious enough to hold a special place amongst Mr. Aitchison's many collectibles.

"I found him to be every bit as great a man as he was a cricketer. He is a very private individual. At no time during the correspondence did I ever get the feeling I was writing to the great Don Bradman."

Sir Donald, rated by many as the greatest batsman who ever lived, died at his home of pneumonia on February 25 last year at the age of 92. He was the only Australian ever knighted for services to the game of cricket.

Mr. Aitchison began corresponding with him following a trip to Australia and New Zealand in 1985.

Mr. Aitchison and his wife Lois stopped over in New Zealand to visit Ken Sandford, who was the manager of three New Zealand Ambassador (cricket) tours to come to Bermuda. It was here in Bermuda he met the Aitchisons.

"We got friendly with him and he said `when we come to New Zealand to stay with him for a few days'," said Mr. Aitchison, who took him up on his offer.

"One morning at breakfast Lois remarked that she always wanted to meet Don Bradman, because in 1938 her father had gone to England for the purpose of seeing Don Bradman play.

"Our host disappeared for a few minutes and came back with a letter and said `here's a letter of introduction, maybe that will help you'. He was a personal friend of Don's from way, way back and he gave us the letter of introduction."

The Aitchisons travelled on to Adelaide, Australia, where Sir Donald lived, but did not get the chance to meet him.

"I get periodic bronchitis and spent the whole time in bed with it and so we never saw him," he explained.

"But when we got back we each wrote a letter and put the letter of introduction with them and sent the three of them off. And he wrote back by return mail!

"We exchanged on average about four letters a year. How he could keep up the correspondence with so many different people around the world is phenomenal, that's as big as any score he ever made! He would never receive a letter that he didn't answer. I read somewhere that he wrote back to everybody."

The correspondence went on for 15 years, with the Aitchisons receiving their last letter from the cricketing legend in 2000, a year before his death. Mr. Aitchison estimates he must have at least 50 letters from Sir Donald. The friends from different parts of the world never did get the opportunity to meet.

"Looking back, I'm almost pleased it worked out this way," Mr. Aitchison explained.

"If you get in the presence of a world celebrity, what do you do, you look at the clock wondering if you are staying too long. Although I've been assured he was never like that, in fact he says so in that first letter.

"This way we got to know each other almost like family. He was a very fine pianist and he and Lois used to exchange tapes. I have a whole tape of him playing the piano.

"I would certainly have liked to have met him but if this was the only way it was going to be, I'm quite happy with it."

Mr. Aitchison still regrets missing the opportunity to see Bradman bat when he played in Scotland as part of the tour of England in 1930. As a 14-year-old who was attending high school in Scotland where his parents were born, Aitchison had the chance to see the Australians playing Scotland at Glasgow. He had something `more important' to do that day.

"My uncle wanted to take me to see it, but some of my young friends came over to the house and said `it's a nice afternoon, let's play cricket' and I couldn't resist doing that," Aitchison says with regret.

"So we went out to a park and played all afternoon while Bradman scored a century in this game against Scotland. My thinking was I'm 14 and he's only 21 and I will have a chance to see him again and it never happened." It was on that same tour that Bradman scored 334 against England at Leeds, the first triple century in a Test match.

Said Aitchison: "They were all waiting for him back at the hotel - he didn't smoke or drink - and he joined them in the bar for a very short time and then excused himself and went up to his room, saying he had some correspondence to deal with.

"He ordered tea and spent the evening catching up on his letter writing."

Bradman scored 6,996 runs at an average of 99.94 an innings, just missing out on ending his career with a 100 average after being bowled second ball by Eric Hollies for a duck in his last innings. He only needed four runs to reach that milestone.

In 52 Tests (82 innings) he scored 29 centuries which, discounting his ten not outs and his multiple hundreds, means Bradman exceeded the century every third time he went out to bat! His career was interrupted at its peak by the Second World War and he missed several years.

Mr. Aitchison has an idea of what he wants to do with his letters from Bradman.

"I'm going to make a file of them," he said.

"A lot of them are written in his own hand. He went through a period of not typing them. I think it is the most phenomenal thing that ever happened to me in my life, finding myself corresponding with him.

"We got to know each other so well that he exchanged a lot of personal information. One of the most interesting stories was how Ken Sandford met him."

Telling the story as it was told to him, Mr. Aitchison said: "Ken was a 12-year-old schoolboy in New Zealand and his dad, as a special trip, took him all the way to Sydney to see Bradman play. On the day they went to the match, Ken was standing near the (players) walkway with a box camera and as Don went by Ken's father said to him `my son would like to take a picture of you'.

"Don stopped and talked to him. He said to him `see that picket fence over there, go and stand by the second post'. Ken went over there and stood and the first three balls that came to Bradman he hit fours on either side of that post. When Bradman came in he saw him still standing there and said `did you get your picture'. That was the start of a friendship and they had been very close friends for years and years. At that particular time Bradman might have still been a teenager, there wasn't much difference in their ages."

Mr. Aitchison made his mark in cricket as a historian, compiling records of 100 years of Cup Match as well as other cricket competitions. During his time watching and covering cricket as a reporter he saw some of the Island's top players in action and rates Alma (Champ) Hunt as the best of a good bunch of players.

"Champ was so good, although a lot of others were pretty close," he stated.

"Champ never looked like getting out. I would have to pick him for being such a good all-rounder. I always think people didn't give him quite enough credit for being the bowler he was, he concentrated so much on his batting.

"If I had to choose another batsman - it's awfully hard to do because when you mention one name 15 others come to mind - it would be (Edward) Bosun Swainson from St. George's. I saw him score a century one afternoon without lifting the ball off the ground. In Bermuda, where the boundaries are a bit short, that is quite a temptation.

"He scored the first century in Cup Match (122 in 1937) and was one run short of a century in the next game. He would have been the first player to score centuries in successive games."

Another player from Swainson's era of whom Aitchison has fond memories is Alec (Cocky) Steede who, like Hunt, was an outstanding allrounder. Steede made more Cup Match appearances than any other player (26) between 1922 and 1951.

Steede was controversially recalled in 1949 when in his mid-1940s and promptly scored 74 and claimed for wickets to take his overall tally to 100 wickets. The 13 wickets he took on his debut in 1922 was then a colt's record before Clarence Parfitt broke it with 15 wickets on his debut in 1965.

"He (Steede) was a true all-rounder," said Mr. Aitchison.

"He lived 50 years before his time. If he had been living now he would be playing for some club over in England. He was a genius, no doubt about it. I don't think he even began to realise how good he was."

Aitchison remembers watching Steede bat in 1949 when he was supposed to be past his prime.

"I was over in the scoring booth it was a hot day and I almost fell asleep watching the match which was headed for a draw," recalled Mr. Aitchison.

"In comes Steede and dances down the wicket on the first ball and immediately put more life into the game."

Cricket has been a way of life for Aitchison for 80 years and he still follows the game closely. Baseball and football are his other favourite sports.

He had a photo of Babe Ruth autographed by the baseball great during a round of golf at Mid Ocean Club in 1937 which Aitchison has given to his son Chris a few years ago.

"It should remain in the family," he stressed.

"I gave it to my son because I don't want anything to happen to it. I was once offered $5,000 for it which I promptly turned down."

Placed on the wall at his home next to the photo and letter from Bradman is a signed photo of Sir Garry Sobers, arguably the greatest allrounder the game of cricket has ever known.

"He was a prince of a fella to talk to," says Aitchison who met Sobers when he came to Bermuda in the late 1970s to help launch the Champion of Champions Tournament.

Sobers and Bradman...champion of champions in their own right, and an 86-year-old Bermudian still proud to have met them.