1890-1899

A Christmas Tale from Liverpool

The retail stores of Liverpool had filled their windows with Christmas gifts to remind their potential customers that the festive season of 1888 was near, when a twenty years old Scotsman arrived at Tithebarn Railway Station to be greeted by the representatives of Everton Football Club. The weary traveller was John William Angus and he had been spotted while playing football in Glasgow, by a talent scout who dispatched him down to Liverpool, where he was to spend a trial period at Anfield. The Scot would have then been taken by the club conveyance, to meet the lady with whom…
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“Our Tam” McInnes, an Everton First

“Our Tam” McInnes, an Everton First

[NB. This article first appeared in the run-up to the Merseyside derby April 2016] When the football clubs of Everton and Liverpool run out to meet each other in the forthcoming Merseyside derby, it will be for the 194th time in the League.   No other city in England can claim to have staged more local derby games at the top level of English football than Liverpool.   The game will take place on the former home of Everton at Anfield before a capacity and fiercely partisan crowd. The atmosphere will be electric.  Yet, when these two deadly rivals first…
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The Magnificent Footballing Andersons of Liverpool

The Magnificent Footballing Andersons of Liverpool

When asked recently who was the first Liverpool-born man to play Association Football for England or score a goal in an FA Cup final, I was not able to answer the question. I then commenced to trawl through the FA records, and after much deliberation, appeared to have found the two most likely candidates to fill these roles. I was surprised to discover that they both belong to the same family. Rupert Darnley Anderson was born on 29 April 1859 and baptised the following June at St Paul's church in the Princes Park area of Liverpool. He was the fifth…
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The Hope of Everton

In November 1890, the Everton executive dispatched their club captain, Andrew Hannah, back to his native Scotland and instructed him to find a player who would strengthen the side and help them clinch the Football League Championship. They informed him he could offer a signing on fee of £50, plus a weekly wage of three pounds and ten shillings a week. Hannah later returned with Hope Ramsey Robertson, who had agreed to join the Anfield club from Patrick Thistle. Robertson was born on 17 January 1868 in the Govan area of Glasgow, and was the third child born to assurance…
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Alex Lochhead, the Everton Wing Half from Neilston

Alex Lochhead, the Everton Wing Half from Neilston

Over the years many Everton players have been asked to make their debut in some tough 'must win' situations. But the first of these must surely be a young Scotsman who arrived in Liverpool during November 1891 at a time when his new club were challenging to take the Football League Championship away from Preston North End. Alexander Lochhead had been born 27 June 1865 in the rural community of Neilson in Renfrewshire, where he began his football career playing for the village team. His style of play soon caught the eye of a talent scout, who invited the young…
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The Life and Times of John Cameron

It had been just four weeks since the first football knockout competition, won the by The Wanderers, had taken place on the Kennington Oval ground in London, when a boy was born on the South West Coast of Scotland. He was destined to make FA Cup history. John Cameron was born on 13 April 1872 in the Newton district of Ayr, where his family, who were in the grocery business, had finally come to settle. The 1881 census recorded the business premises on Waggon Road, where John was by then an eight-year-old scholar. He later attended Ayr Grammar School. In…
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From Leicester Fosse to Leicester City…

From Leicester Fosse to Leicester City…

The Premier League champions are at Goodison Park this afternoon but did you know that the club played for 25 years after its formation before becoming Leicester City? Today’s visitors were formed in 1884 by a group of young men from a local evangelical chapel who decided to form a football team that they chose to call Leicester Fosse. This suffix was selected because the old Roman Road, known as the Fosseway, had once passed through the area. The group then all agreed to pay nine old pence membership fee and another nine pence was collected to purchase a football.…
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The Holy Trinity of Our Forefathers Part III:  Dr James Clement Baxter

The Holy Trinity of Our Forefathers Part III: Dr James Clement Baxter

  Previously there has been a concerted effort by the Everton FC Shareholders Association, and particularly by one fellow Evertonian, Paul Wharton, to endorse our song And if you know your history. Paul has been dubbed the Everton Sherlock Holmes. He has been driven to find out the true story behind our clubs formation and the founder fathers who delivered to us this fantastic club. When I read about our club's past it really does make your heart go whoohhoo! It is now generally accepted that the following gentleman were the driving force in forming and making Everton; Ben Swift…
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Why Leicester Fosse?

History will be made today when the present Premier League champions take to the field for what is their first ever FA Cup tie at Goodison Park. The visitors were formed in 1884 by a group of young men from a local evangelical chapel who decided to form a football team that they chose to call Leicester Fosse. This suffix was chosen because the old Roman Road, known as the Fosse Way, had once passed through the area and a military encampment was constructed to protect it from attack near to the spot where it forded the River Soar. The…
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Alec Brady – Anfield legend honoured by Everton Heritage Society

Alec Brady – Anfield legend honoured by Everton Heritage Society

Everton's first title winner - at Anfield - has his grave rededicated     Alec Brady   EVERTON and Celtic supporters share a line from a famous old song. Separated by 200 miles and a national border, both sets of supporters still sing about “a grand old team to play for” - and in that song celebrate each club’s “history.” Those words were made real last weekend, when the Celtic Graves Society and the Everton Heritage Society joined forces to rededicate the grave of a Victorian pioneer who graced both clubs. Alec Brady was an Everton original. A Scottish inside…
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