Bob Fulton, nicknamed “Bozo” was named alongside Gasnier, Raper and Churchill as one of rugby league’s four original ‘Immortals’ in 1981, the highest honour the game can bestow upon a player. The English-born centre/five-eighth possessed both individual brilliance and a single-minded will to win in equal measures, which explains why the Manly legend is one of the few men to win premierships as a both a player (1972, ’73 and ’76) as well as a coach (’87, ’96).

Fulton was born in Stockton Heath, a civil parish of Warrington, in the English county of Cheshire. He moved to Australia with his family when he was four years old. At 18 years of age, Fulton made his senior football debut in the Illawarra Rugby League with Western Suburbs in 1965 and went on to represent Country Seconds.

Bob Fulton was signed to Sydney's Manly-Warringah by club secretary Ken Arthurson after being spotted by John Hobbs (Manly talent scout) and started his NSWRFL first grade career in 1966 aged 19. Fulton made 219 appearances for the Manly club between 1966 and 1976. He scored 520 points (129 tries, 10 goals and 56 field goals) – the club's record try tally until Steve Menzies went one better in 2006. Fulton won premierships with Manly in 1972 (also the League's top try-scorer this season), 1973 and 1976. In the 1973 bloodbath against Cronulla he single-handedly took control of the game scoring two tries to take the side to victory.

Following the 1969 season, Fulton accepted an offer to play a season with his 'home town' club Warrington in the 1969–70 English season. Fulton played 16 games for Warrington, scoring 16 tries and kicking 1 field goal before returning to Australia and Manly.

At the end of the 1976 season Fulton caused a sensation in Sydney rugby league circles when he left Manly and signed a 3-year deal with the Eastern Suburbs club. He left Manly holding the club record for most tries. Fulton played 56 matches for the Eastern Suburbs club, mainly at five-eighth. In his first season there Fulton was a member of the side that won the pre-season cup and was the club's leading try scorer. On both of his Kangaroo Tours Fulton was the leading try scorer – with 20 tries from 5 Tests and 9 tour matches in 1973 and 9 tries from 5 Tests and 10 tour matches in 1978.

After retiring as a player at Easts, Fulton became coach of the Roosters. His was one of the few clubs opposed to the State of Origin concept when it first began and he called it the "non-event of the century". At the end of his first season as coach, he took Easts to the 1980 Grand Final where they were beaten by the Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs. He went on to coach the Roosters for two more seasons. year took them to a Grand Final against the Parramatta Eels where the club was unsuccessful for the second year running. In 1987, he guided the Paul Vautin-captained Sea Eagles side to a premiership victory over the Canberra Raiders in the last Grand Final played at the Sydney Cricket Ground, becoming in the process the first person at Manly to win premierships both as captain and as coach.

In 1989, Fulton succeeded Don Furner as coach of the Australian national side. He guided the team in 39 Tests between 1989 and 1998 to 32 victories, one draw and six losses, including the successful 1990 and 1994 Kangaroo tours, as well as winning both the 1992 and 1995 World Cup finals. In 1993 Fulton returned to Manly as coach and he guided the club to three successive Grand Finals from 1995. Fulton won his second and last premiership as a coach in 1996 when in their 50th season the Manly-Warringah club defeated St George 20–8 in a win at the Sydney Football Stadium.

Fulton is one of only two people to have gone on four Kangaroo Tours. Fulton toured as a player in 1973 and 1978 and as team coach in 1990 and 1994. The other is Mal Meninga who made four tours as a player on the unbeaten 1982 and 1986 tours and as the team captain under Fulton's coaching in both 1990 and 1994.

From 1997, Fulton was a member of the Continuous Call Team, first on radio 2UE, and later on 2GB with Ray Hadley.

Fulton, aged 73, died of cancer on 23 May 2021 at St Vincent's Hospital in Darlinghurst, Sydney. A state funeral was offered by premier of New South Wales. He was laid to rest at St Mary's Cathedral in Sydney on 4 June 2021, with hundreds of Australian sporting and media personalities in attendance.

In 1981, he was selected by the publication Rugby League Week as one of the initial four post-war "Immortals" of the Australian game alongside Churchill, Raper and Gasnier. Fulton was also inducted into the Sport Australia Hall of Fame in 1985. In 1994 Fulton was inducted as a Member of the Order of Australia "for service to rugby league football" and in 2000 he received the Australian Sports Medal. In 2002 he was inducted into the Australian Rugby League Hall of Fame.

In February 2008, Fulton was named in the list of Australia's 100 Greatest Players (1908–2007) by the NRL and ARL to celebrate the code's centenary year in Australia. In 2008 New South Wales announced their rugby league team of the century also, naming Fulton as a five-eighth.