Earlestown Football 1900s

[cavasta]

My great grandfather, Tommy Cunliffe, played football for Earlestown in 1905. He also played for various other league and non-league sides throughout the 1900s and 1910s. I have the following information about him:

“Born Wigan 1886. Outside Left who started as a schoolboy with Audenshaw in 1898 moving on to join Hooley Hill FC in 1902, then Earlestown in March 1905. A year later he joined Blackburn Rovers but was released and joined St Helens Recreation in June 1907. He joined Liverpool between February 1916 & October 1917 (playing 57 games in the Lancashire Combination) before moving to Altrincham. Signed by Oldham Athletic from August 1919 to June 1920, playing just 2 games for the "Latics" and on his release he joined Mossley.”

If anyone can provide me with any further information, or point me in the right direction, I would be very grateful.

Thanks

[Steven]

Hi cavasta

Sorry, I really don't know that much about the teams that were in the area, there doesn't seem to have been anything written abot them in any texts I have read, though I would imagine there will be quite a bit in the old newspaper microfiche that they have at Newton Library, I would imagine that the played every weekend somewhere, and that on the following week it got reported upon, so your grandfather must feature in a report somewhere.

One football related thing that has happened recently is that I was contacted by the historian for Manchester United, it seems that their original Kit was the exact opposite to the earlestown Kit, the earlestown one was a Black Maltese Cross on a White Shirt, and the original Manchester United was White Cross on Black, but the shape, size and position of the cross's are supposed to be exactly the same, so he wondered if somehow there was a tie up between the two teams, all I could think was that maybe its as simple as they used the same supplier for the kit, and the manufacturer used the same template for cutting the Manchester United Kit as the earlestown one, the crosses cut out of one kit, to sow into the other, and viceversa, so that each kit ended up being a negative of the other.

well, twas the best I could come up with at the time

Steven Dowd

[mwheatley]

manchester united were once known as Newton Heath, i admit its more than likely somewhere closer to manchester, but a coincidence?

[cavasta]

Thanks Steven. The local newspapers should as you say be an excellent source of information. I'm not from the area, so will have to plan a trip up there to do a spot of research of my own. It's on my list of things to do. Thanks again.

[Podstar66]

Are you sure it was Man U ?
Manchester City had the kit you describe as of 1884, that is according to an Historical Kits website.

http://www.historicalkits.co.uk/Manches ... r_City.htm

There is a photo showing the team wearing the kit.

Pod

[Steven]

er

mmm

well i was never any good at football

so i may well have said the wrong one.

will check and correctly add to this later

Steven Dowd

[Fielding Melish]

As a child there was a field behind Newton Tech college that had various ponds full of tadpoles etc and a 'bowl' shaped indentation in the middle. The field has been cleared and now accomodates St Marys Primary School. It was always refered to as 'Bows field'. Talking to my Uncle he said there used to be a football team called 'Earlestown Bohemians' that played their matches there. Assume that the indentation was once the pitch.
However I can find no record of any football team of that name in the area.
Anyone any info?

[bill morse]

My grandad played for Earlestown Bohemians and I have a pic somewhere - will see if I can dig it out. As I understand it, Bohemians were the less fashionable of the two main teams in the town. Earlestown White Star were the Manchester United to Bohemians Manchester City!

[Podstar66]

I have a postcard of Earlestown AFC 1907 with what I believe could be the 'Lancashire FA Challenge Trophy'
They won this trophy in 1903 and 1907.
There are no names for the players, but someone may know them, if they had relatives who played for Earlestown FC etc.

Earlestown AFC - 1907 - 003.jpg

Pod

ps, you mean they were the richest club in the world at the time? LoL

[bill morse]

Brilliant pic - they didn't muck about when it came to mustaches in those dasys did they

[WillieBob]

My grandad played for Earlestown Bohemians and I have a pic somewhere - will see if I can dig it out. As I understand it, Bohemians were the less fashionable of the two main teams in the town. Earlestown White Star were the Manchester United to Bohemians Manchester City!

Hi Bill, any chance you could dig out that photo? I'd be interested to see it. Alternatively, if Steven coyuld point me in the direction of a similar photo in the archive it would be appreciated. (I note that the Photo section doesn't seem to be available at the monent) Thanks.

[bill morse]

Hi Williebob

I'm consumed with guilt now but in order to try and put things right I have sifted through hundreds and hundreds of old photos and I've found the rascal. I have a scanner but I'm not sure how/where to upload it to. If someone can help a simple soul let me know. In the meantime mate, if you want to send me a pm with your e-mail addy I can send it to you direct.

Just to set your expectation level though, I have no idea of when it was taken nor of anyone's identity other than my grandad of course.

Off now to put the photos away - unfortunately I know for a fact that I will now spend hours examining them looking at my/my family's old mug shots before the pics are returned to the loft

[WillieBob]

Thanks for going to all that trouble Bill. Not having a scanner myself i'm not sure what procedures you will need to take in order to post it. Ordinarily I would assume that so llong as the scanner has been configured to your pc correctly, once scanned, the picture will now be sat in one of your files somewhere. It's then just a case of selecting the "upload attachment" tab and then "browse" to the relevant pic', then just click "Add the file". Pretty much the same procedure for attaching it to an email.......pm sent btw. Thanks.

[WillieBob]

Discovered today - amongst other things - that Bohemians were formely called Earlestown CYMS, they changed their name in approximately 1936 when they joined the Liverpool Combination League. And also i'm 90% certain that their kit was green and white although I have no idea as to the pattern/style.

[Fielding Melish]

Makes sense. CYMS being 'over the road' from there in Patterson St.
Cheers all!