In the post this week this beautiful little fanzine arrived. I’d never even heard of From London To Manchester before but eBay turns up all sorts of wonderful things. Issue 3 seems to be from the early 90s as on one page there is reference made to the spat between Manchester United’s brilliant if controversial Red Issue and the essential When Saturday Comes.
It was published from Chiswick in London and was the usual mix of serious and silly pieces, a history of stadia sitting next to an “interview” with old pro Mr Albert Oldbastard. It’s fairly standard stuff but a good read nonetheless and if anyone has any more details or knowledge let me know, it’s now on The List but with a very basic entry.
Anyway, we’re here for floodlights and they duly appear on a centre spread piece along with a terrible photo of the pylon/lights at Selhurst Park. the article itself is brief but interesting. The news of the first match as being in Sheffield” could perhaps have mentioned that it was at the still in use Bramhall Lane and the internet informs me that “Dynamo machines powered by steam engines and batteries powered the lights”
From here on a number of mysteries creep in (go easy though, they didn’t have the internet back then.) It says the Dell hosted the first competitive game but fails to mention that this was a reserve match and that nearby Fratton Park hosted the first floodlit league game (Portsmouth 0-2 Newcastle United, February 1956 more on this later). In Scotland Stenhousemuir may have hosted a friendly in 1951 but Vale of Leven got there way before that in October 1878 with a friendly against 3rd Lanark at Cathkin Park. This took place in what seem to be comedic circumstances with a giant reflector for the light being used to chase the ball and players around the pitch.1 I can’t believe this device wasn’t used in Ripping Yarns terrific Goalden Gordon episode.
It’s still a great little fanzine piece and as far as I know it’s right that my hometown team were the last to have floodlights but bloody great flood lights they were at that.
The superb club historian Stuart Basson chips in with this little bit of minutiae “The Spireites were the last Football League team to install lights, but might have been the first to play under them, had they not declined the suggestion to play under Rochdale’s lights in the 1955-6 season.” Just another what might have been after that scoundrel David Elleray robbed us. No, I will NEVER let it go!
Leave a Reply