Andy Mitchell the co-author of the excellent ‘1824 The World’s First Foot-Ball Club’ book (http://www.scottishsporthistory.com/worlds-first-foot-ball-club.html) has kindly sent me images of John Denton’s prize from the 1865 Sheffield FC Athletic sports. John Denton was Sheffield FC’s Hon. Sec. in 1869 and 1870. He won the tankard for coming second in the quarter mile. The man who beat […]
Fordingbridge Turks FC England’s 12th oldest Association football club (and Hampshire’s oldest surviving Football Club) celebrate their 150th birthday this Saturday 19th May. Present day games are played on the Recreation Ground as well as at Burgate School and Fordingbridge Junior School but the club would love to have a home of its own. Melanie Gill, […]
It is only with the launch of the ‘Sheffield Home of Football’ walking app bit.ly/2ILUKLg that we have been able to set the exact modern day location of Park House which is where the first Sheffield FC footballers got changed before a football match (in October 1857) and where they first wrote the club’s rules of governance.Looking […]
Photographs of the Sheffield Library event courtesy of Ellis Carr, Nick Partridge and Stephen Elliot. Discover the app yourself -download here: bit.ly/2ILUKLg The crowd gathers at Heeley Parish Church – The grave of Nathaniel Creswick and the world’s oldest football club formed from a church. Geoffrey Norton – oldest surviving descendant of Nathaniel Creswick. […]
John Marsh features significantly in my book A History of Sheffield Football 1857-1889: Speed, Science and Bottom http://bit.ly/2qYw0r0 Tomorrow (April 22nd) is the launch of the ‘Sheffield: The Home of Football Free walking app’ which can be downloaded here: https://bit.ly/2ILUKLg John Marsh was captain of the Sheffield FA team who played the London FA in […]
We hope you are looking forward to the Sheffield: Home of Football walk on Sunday as much as we are. In advance of the event, we want to highlight a few practical considerations for everyone to bear in mind. About the Sheffield: Home of Football app Please make sure you have downloaded the Sheffield: Home […]
William Henry Foulke is probably Sheffield’s most famous footballer of all time but is probably unrecognisable to the average reader without his ubiquitous nickname of ‘Fatty’. In the same way that everyone Googles ‘Gazza’ rather than ‘Paul Gascoigne’, poor old Fatty Foulkes is doomed to be forever associated with his nickname rather than his amazing […]
On the 4th of September 1889 a meeting was held at the Central Café in Sheffield’s High Street to discuss the ‘desirability of offering a Challenge Shield for competition between the elementary schools of the town run on the same lines that have guided the Birmingham Junior Challenge Shield.’ On the 21st September 1889 at […]
As the author of A History of Sheffield Football 1857-1889: Speed, Science and Bottom (available to purchase here http://bit.ly/2qYw0r0) I was approached by Sheffield Libraries to design the route and write the content for a free to download app that offers a walking guide to the heritage of Sheffield football, it is called ‘Sheffield: The Home […]
I have been researching English football history for over 10 years and as a Sheffielder I became increasingly perplexed as places such as Lancashire, London and Zurich all laid claim to the ownership of the birth of Association Football. Meanwhile in Sheffield itself we seem content not to shout about our footballing achievements from the […]
