AISA Arsenal History Society: preserving Arsenal's heritage
By Tony Attwood If you have heard a bit about Henry Norris (later Lt Col Sir Henry Norris) the chances are it will be bad. Which is a shame, since he was the man who singled handedly made sure that Arsenal survived its darkest hour in 1910. Today, 18 May, is the anniversary of …
Read More “The day Arsenal went to the wall, and the man who brought us back from the dead.”
The full anniversary index is here and we’ve just updated the June file. Meanwhile here is the list of anniversaries for today 17 May. If you think we’ve missed any, please do write in. 17 May 1959: Eddie Magill signed from Portadown and started playing for Arsenal in December. In 1961 he also started playing for …
Read More “17 May: the day of 4 Arsenal cup finals and 4 last ever games.”
George Jobey (July 1885 – 9 May 1962) was born Heddon near Newcastle on Tyne. If George Jobey’s name is mentioned at all by Arsenal fans these days (and sadly precious few know his name) it will be because of one of two reasons, both related to 6 September 1913: the first game at Highbury. …
Read More “George Jobey, the real story of the man who scored the first Arsenal goal at Highbury”
Here are all the main events in Arsenal’s history from 13 May. The full list across the whole year will be published in Arsenal: The Chronology. ———————————- 13 May 1904: Archibald Gray joined Woolwich Arsenal from Hibernian with whom he had won the Scottish League and Cup, playing 51 league games. He played in Arsenal’s first …
Read More “It’s Coquelin’s birthday, and other Arsenal anniversaries”
12 May 1910: Arsenal announced that talks with Fulham to rescue the club had come to nothing, and the directors of Woolwich Arsenal FC had opened discussions with Tottenham Hotspur and Chelsea, to see if their boards wanted to buy all or part of the club. 12 May 1945: Alan Ball born. He played for …
Read More “From going bust to winning the cup. Arsenal on 12 May”
Win a free copy of the forthcoming volume, “Arsenal: The Chronology” The details below are taken from the forthcoming volume, “Arsenal: The Chronology” which will place around 5000 important dates in the history of Arsenal in date order, with a line or three on each event. If you spot an error here, please drop a …
Read More “From the advert that made Chapman apply to Arsenal to scoring 7 and 8.”
Win a free copy of the forthcoming volume, “Arsenal: The Chronology” The details below are taken from the forthcoming volume, “Arsenal: The Chronology” which will place around 5000 important dates in the history of Arsenal in date order, with a line or three on each event. If you spot an error here, please drop a …
Read More “From Bergkamp to Boldklubben Frem: 14 Arsenal events from 10 May”
By Tony Attwood Ehud ‘Tim’ Rogers was born in Chirk a town with a population of around 4000 in Wrexham County Borough in Wales on 15 October 1909. He played football primarily as an outside right at Weston Rhyn, Llanerch, and then Chirk. Chirk was obviously his local team, but it was much more prestigious …
Read More “Ehud ‘Tim’ Rogers; a Welsh winger whose chances were limited”
By Tony Attwood If Archie Low, the subject of our last investigation, was something of a mystery as an Arsenal player, John William “Jack” Lee is even more tantalising. Indeed the few sources that mention can can’t actually agree on his date and place of birth. Marylebone on 1 February 1902 is the version that looks right …
Read More “The strange case of Jack Lee and Arsenal’s link to Chesterfield.”
By Tony Attwood We’ve still got a lot of players to cover on this web site, but having written about many of the more famous sons of Arsenal, some of the names that come up now are getting a little obscure in terms of their time at our club. However, the aim is to cover …
By Tony Attwood On 17 January 1988 my pal Roger and I went to see Coventry City v Arsenal. It was a 2-2 draw with a crowd of 22,864 and Patrick Vieira was sent off on 65 minutes and David Seaman broke his finger. (We didn’t realise at the time but it was the 23rd …
Read More “Nicolas Anelka: the man who could have played alongside Thierry Henry”
14 historic Arsenal events that happened on 2 May across the years. 2 May 1910: As part of the attempt to build a recovery programme for Arsenal’s finances and show supporters that he was not trying to take over the club himself Henry Norris advertised shares in Arsenal in Athletic News for £1 each. …
Read More “14 historic Arsenal events that happened on 2 May across the years.”
?May 1889: Singleton and Stewart, two of the men who led the split away from Royal Arsenal to form ROFFC attend the annual dinner as leading members of RAFC. The exact date is unknown. 1 May 1902 Tim Coleman, one of the stalwarts of early football trade unionism, joined Arsenal from Northampton. He went on …
Read More “Arsenal on this day: Twenty Arsenal stories from 1st May.”
By Tony Attwood Jon Sammels played for Arsenal between 1963 and 1971 and I remember him well. Of course in those days the amount of information we had about the club was far less than now, and I never understood why he left when, as far as I could see, he was still such a …
Read More “Jon Sammels: wonderful player, victim of the 1960s Anti-Arsenal “fans””
By Tony Attwood The match on 22 October 1952 was one of three friendlies played by Arsenal in the 1952/3 season. The other two were linked to particular causes. First, on 29 September 1952 Arsenal played a team known as the All Stars, at Brighton. It was the benefit match for our goalkeeper Alex Wilson, …
Read More “Arsenal 7 Hibernian 1. Arsenal’s first televised game under the lights.”
By Tony Attwood It is sometimes said by statisticians that no one really remembers FA Cup semi-finals, and the media will undoubtedly be quick to forget the hype they made about the inevitability of Liverpool getting to the 2015 final so Gerrard could play on his birthday, and undoubtedly score the winning goal in his …
Read More “Arsenal and Arsène Wenger create new FA Cup records”
It seems a long time since we had a techno problem on Untold Arsenal, but here we are on cup semi-final day, and it is down. There’s a note popping up if you try to log on saying there is a loop. I’ve asked a colleague to look at it, but it is saturday, and …
Edward Miller Carr (known as Eddie) was born in Wheatley Hill on 3 October 1917 and worked as a teenager at Wheatley Colliery. At 17 he signed as an amateur footballer for Arsenal, going first to the Margate nursery club, and turning professional in time for the start of the 1936/7 season. This was a …
Read More “Eddie Carr played 12 games for Arsenal and won us the league!”
By Richard Bedwell On 11 April 1964, fifty-one years ago, I attended my first ever professional football match. It was at Highbury to see Arsenal play out a 0-0 draw against Blackburn Rovers in front of a crowd that barely half filled a ground which had a capacity at that time some 10% bigger …
Read More “Arsenal v Blackburn 1964, and the promise of a heated pitch”
by Tony Attwood George Drury was born in Hucknell on 22 January 1914 played 40 times for Arsenal either side of the Second World War. He played for Heanor and Sheffield Wednesday in September 1934 and moved to Arsenal for £7,000 in March 1938. He won a championship winners’ medal and he also played in the …
Read More “George Drury: the man who refused to be sent off against Moscow Dynamo”
By Tony Attwood As footballing ideas go, this one looks to have been just about the craziest of all time. To have a tour of Scotland immediately after the Football League season had finished, and end up playing nine games in ten days, is, well, bizarre. But that is what happened, and the games are …
Read More “Why on earth did Arsenal go to Scotland and play nine games in ten days!”
Mike Tiddy was born on 4 April 1929. Mike first joined Torquay United when football resumed after the second world war, undertook his National Service and then played with the club until November 1950 when he signed for Cardiff City. He played 145 league games in five years with Cardiff before going to Arsenal, with …
By Tony Attwood The Southern Floodlight Challenge Cup (also known as Southern Professional Floodlit Cup, and to some as the Southern Professional Floodlight Cup) was won once by Arsenal – on 27 April 1959. It was run from the 1955/56 season to 1959/60 but then in 1960 the competition was closed down and the Football League Cup …
Read More “Arsenal in the Southern Floodlight Challenge Cup (Southern Professional Floodlit Cup)”
On 4 April 2015 Arsenal made it seven consecutive wins in a row in the league, starting with a 2-1 home win over Leicester City on 10 February. Of course runs are hard to create – so I thought I might highlight a few of the great runs the club has had over the years. …
Read More “Arsenal have just broken another record. Here’s their great consecutive sequences”
Colin Frederick Hill as born on 12 November 1963 in Uxbridge. He played first for Hillingdon Borough before joining Arsenal as a schoolboy in 1977, becoming an apprentice in 1980, and then on 31 July 1981 Colin Hill signs professional terms. He made his debut for Arsenal’s first team on 20 April 1983 in the Norwich …
Read More “Colin Hill: one big season, and the stadium of kicking a ball in any direction”
