Goodison

Kicker Sportsmagazin visits Goodison Park

Jorg Jakob, correspondent for Kicker Sportsmagazin in Germany, visited Goodison Park and St Luke’s, where he met members of the society. Below is the original magazine article followed by an English translation. This is the article he produced on 23 March 2017. KLOPP’S NEIGHBOUR By Jorg Jacob, Kicker Magazine, Germany Before the duel at Anfield on Saturday, Jorg Jacob, Sports correspondent for the German football magazine ‘Kicker’, visited Everton Football Club and the Everton Heritage Society, to experience the life of Everton supporters in Liverpool. At the age of ten, Richard Gillham experienced his first derby win in 1978, at…
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Goodison Park, a Greyhound Stadium and Walton Hall Park

Goodison Park, a Greyhound Stadium and Walton Hall Park

The Lily Parr statue at the National Football Museum Everton and the Rise, Fall and Revival of Women’s Football  This December marks a centenary of one of the most significant football matches played at Goodison Park – but it did not involve Everton FC.  The participants were Preston’s Dick, Kerr Ladies FC and their St. Helens counterparts. The festive season match, in front of a record crowd for a women’s match, suggested that the women’s game was on the way to establishing itself as a mainstream spectator sport. 15 years later Dick, Kerr Ladies - rebadged as Preston Ladies -…
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Goodison Park – The New Home of Everton (1892)

Goodison Park – The New Home of Everton (1892)

Billy Smith has been a royal blue bloodhound for many years, sniffing out historic articles about our beloved club in microfilm archives across the region. These nuggets are posted on his excellent Blue Correspondent website (bluecorrespondent.co.uk). Working chronologically, he has reached the 1962/63 season but Billy continues locate and transcribe previously hidden gems from earlier eras. One vein of high-quality content mined by Billy is Athletic News (The Athletic News and Cyclists' Journal, to give it its full title). This Manchester-based weekly newspaper, which ran from 1875 to 1931 was a keen proponent of Association Football in its early decades. Mere Green…
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The ‘real’ story behind Everton’s enduring anthem Z-Cars

The ‘real’ story behind Everton’s enduring anthem Z-Cars

"When did Everton first run out to Z-Cars at Goodison?" We’re closer than we’ve ever been to a definitive answer     Goodison Park, home of Everton FC   It's a question which has been asked almost as many times as it has been played: When did Everton first run out to Z-Cars at Goodison? And today, thanks to some splendid research from the Everton Heritage Society, we’re closer than we’ve ever been to a definitive answer. That’s closer. But still not spot on. Because a mystery which has lasted half-a-century deserves to retain some allure.  And a theme as evocative,…
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Goodison Under Attack!

Goodison Under Attack!

  Merseyside was badly hit by enemy air raids during the Second World War, which peaked during the May Blitz of 1941.  However, the bombing had begun the previous summer, with attacks increasing during September 1940.    On the night of 18/19 September, several bombs landed in the Everton and Walton area, including Gwladys Street, causing serious injury to nearby residents while also damaging the Gwladys Street Stand. In Bullens Road, a bomb dropped in the school yard opposite, badly damaging the exterior wall of the stand, while also perforating the roof. A third bomb hit the outside of the practice…
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St Luke’s – the church with its own football ground

ST LUKE’S – THE CHURCH WITH ITS OWN FOOTBALL STADIUM! Although Everton F.C. started life as the St Domingo’s church team in 1878, it is now closely associated with another place of worship. St. Luke the Evangelist, nestled between the Main and Howard Kendall Gwladys Street Stands, contributes to the uniqueness of The Old Lady. But why does the stadium have a church in such an unlikely spot? A wooden Church of England mission hall predated Goodison Park by at least nine years. Therefore, since its opening in 1892, the stadium has had to grow around this sacred spot. In…
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 Archibald Leitch – The Man Who Shaped Goodison Park

At the start of the 20th Century, Goodison Park was arguably, England’s premier football stadium. Today, for better or worse, it is one of the most historic in the land. As you sit in your seat and look across the famous 'Old Lady', two of the stands you see can be credited to Archibald Leitch — stadium designer extraordinaire. Glasgow-born Leitch was an architect specialising in the design of industrial buildings when he was commissioned to design a new 80,000-capacity Ibrox Stadium for Rangers, the club he supported.  The resulting stadium was spectacular but tragedy struck in 1902 when fatalities resulted…
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Rob Howarth – a Former Everton Captain

The host of FA dignitaries who had been present at the opening of Goodison Park had now left Liverpool and the Everton committee assembled to start the new Football League season in earnest.  (Goodison had been officially opened on 24 August 1892 by Lord Kinnaird and Frederick Wall of the Football Association. No football was played; instead the 12,000 crowd watched a short athletics event followed by music and a fireworks display). Their first opponents would be Nottingham Forest. The much published decision to move from Anfield was complete and the new club, now a limited liability company, would be…
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Clocking On…

The Good Old Days of the Three O'Clock Kick-Off.....   Today’s 2.05pm kick-off inevitably gets supporters talking about the ‘good old days’, when we remember all football matches being played on a Saturday afternoon at 3pm… but just how common was that 3pm time slot? Well, it depends on how far back you look! Prior to the Premier League era, most of Everton’s home matches, aside from those played in midweek, did indeed commence at the ‘traditional’ time of 3pm – but that had only been the case from the early 1960s onwards. From 1957 to late 1961, Everton’s Saturday…
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Harry Williams – Death of a Mascot

Aside from the iconic Toffee Lady, Everton supporters in the 1930s also possessed two unofficial mascots. Harry Williams of Westminster Road, Kirkdale, and his near neighbour, William Jones, would “play up” for Blues fans both home and away. Williams would wear his trademark mock policeman’s uniform, decorated with the club colours whilst Jones would don a blue and white chess-board suit. In the days before fences and enclosures, the firm friends were often permitted to “conduct” the crowds from the cinder path bordering the pitch. When Everton travelled to St Andrew’s on 11 February 1939 for a FA Cup 5th…
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