This is our daily review of Arsenal anniversaries taken from the Arsenal day by day files prepared by the AISA Arsenal History Society.
Here are the stories from this day in history…
18 December 1909: After 3 wins in a row, in which they scored seven, Woolwich Arsenal started a run of three home games in a row but lost two and drew one. This 1-2 home defeat to Notts C was the first of five without a win.
18 December 1920: Bradford City 3 Arsenal 1. In this season both Bradford clubs were in the 1st division. By 1927 both were in the Third Division North.
18 December 1926: Arsenal 2 Tottenham 4 – a defeat that moved Chapman to ring the changes. Arsenal lost the next game, but after that just one of the next eight as newly purchased players were slowly bedded into the team.
18 December 1931: Jack Humble, one of the founding fathers and the first ever chairman of Woolwich Arsenal FC, died after a lifetime of service to the club. He played for Royal Arsenal, and worked continuously to save the club in 1910, and remained a director until 1927. As such he was the director’s last connection with Royal Arsenal, but lived long enough to see Arsenal win the FA Cup, although sadly he died half way through Arsenal;s first title winning season.
18 December 1931: William Harper transferred to Plymouth. He played 82 for Plymouth and was then given the honour of a testimonial match against Arsenal in 1972 and had the training ground of Argyle named after him: Harper’s Park.
18 December 1937: Final game for Joe Hulme – Liverpool 2 Arsenal 0. He won three league champions medals and two FA Cup winners’ medals and was the only player to play in all of the first four Arsenal Cup Finals of the 1930s.
18 December 1954: Newcastle 5 Arsenal 1. Arsenal then rebounded from this defeat by going unbeaten in the next five games.
18 December 1969: David Hillier born. He played schoolboy football for Blackheath before joining Arsenal in January 1984 as an associated schoolboy turning professional in February 1988.
18 December 2001: League match 17 of the third Double season. Arsenal’s final defeat of the season. Arsenal 1 Newcastle 3. All three defeats were at home – the other two being to Leeds and Charlton. Arsenal won 18 and drew three of the remaining games.
18 December 2005: Arsenal 0 Chelsea 2. Arsenal’s third consecutive defeat. In the run, Arsenal had scored nil and let in five, being beaten also by Bolton and Newcastle. 10 years on, Bolton, came bottom of the Championship while Newcastle were relegated from the Premier League.
The latest post from our series on Henry Norris at the Arsenal
Arsenal, 11 – 31 December 1918. A 9-2 victory, the chairman becomes an MP, footballers unionise.
Yesterday’s anniversaries:
On this day in history an Arsenal favourite scored his first hattrick for the club. But who?
Special feature:
Highbury: from start to end with previously unseen pictures of the end of the stadium.
What’s on the Arsenal History Society site
An index to the various series that contain over 1,700 articles on this site concerning the history of Arsenal appears on our home page.
