Why does Making the Arsenal focus on 1910?
If you are a reader of HIGHBURY HIGH (and if not, why not) you will know that I consider 1910 to be the key point in the history of Arsenal.
I won’t spoil the whole article in HIGHBURY HIGH (and I will put details of how you can buy the magazine even if you don’t attend Arsenal matches) but here’s the key point.
In 1910 Woolwich Arsenal FC was a first division football club that went bust when its main backer (a local gentleman’s outfitters) said he couldn’t do any more for the club, and needed other people to put money in.
A fund-raising committee was set up, but its efforts, although valiant, were not enough to save the club. But then along came Henry Norris, the owner of Fulham, who bought the club.
No one is quite clear why Norris bought Woolwich Arsenal, and as a many who left no diaries or papers to explain his thinking, we won’t ever know, but the answer is probably that he wanted to get one over Chelsea, who had come along and set up a ground close to Fulham’s.
This didn’t happen – and so instead Norris looked for an alternative approach. Eventually he did three things which founded the modern Arsenal.
1. He moved Woolwich Arsenal to Highbury, and dropped the name Woolwich
2. He orchestrated our return to the First Division in 1919 – from which we have never been relegated.
3. He brought in Herbert Chapman
Norris was not a nice man, and when I first looked at writing the story of 1910 – the year that Norris took over – I wondered how I could do it when the central character was quite clearly a bully and an unpleasant character with few redeeming features.
It was because of this problem that I decided first to write “Making the Arsenal” as a novel, and secondly to create a fictional character who would have the job of tracking Norris and working out what he was really up to.
Norris is therefore seen through the eyes of a junior Fleet Street journalist – a man who might be expected to be bullied by Norris, but who through sheer determination stands up to him.
I also felt that if I wrote the story of 1910 and Arsenal as a straight historical document there are many people who would find it too dry and who would be put off by the fact that it is, after all, history.
So I turned it into a novel. Taking the events of 1910 (and it was a great year in history) and relating them to Arsenal, and my central character, Jacko Jones.
I’ll be putting up more about the book and the story of 1910 in the coming days. In the meanwhile if you want to read daily news about Arsenal from a thoroughly independent (but utterly pro-Wenger) point of view, you might like to read UNTOLD ARSENAL (www.blog.emiratesstadium.info)
Now back to the start – Highbury High. It is the classic pro-Arsenal fanzine, and if you would like to read some of the best articles about Arsenal, for just £2 per issue, you really should buy it.
If you don’t get to Arsenal games you can buy it on line, or by sending a cheque or postal order…
· 6 issue subscription, delivery to
· 6 issues, delivered to a
· Or six issues in the rest of the world (£18.00)…
Just in case any link doesn’t work for you, you can go to www.shop.firstandbest.co.uk and you will see the three options there at the top of the selection of new products.
The amount in pounds will be translated into your local currency for your credit card bill, which will show in the name Hamilton House.
You can also buy with a cheque. Prices are the same…
6 issue subscription £12 (
Cheques payable to Highbury High
Address: 11 Tannington Terrace,
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