After 106 years since it was first published, the Football Echo will cease to exist as we know it at the end of this calender year. It will still be available on line, but that will just not be the same..
My first job was as office boy at the Echo, every monday morning I had to roll up the Football Echo's and mail them to every corner of the world for subscribers....Sad to hear they are stopping the paper version.
The Pink was the Ronnie Gill's version mate. It ceased production years ago. I used to get a penny for everyone I sold, used to stand outside the Hobson Hotel flogging them on a Saturday night many moons ago.
Right, vaguely recall my dad getting the odd one but it wasn't sold in darlington for some reason. Were they both printed on pink paper?
The Echo has been both pink & green, more of an amber colour rather than pink though, The Pink was always on pink paper from what I can remember. We couldn't get the Echo where I grew up as a boy so had to make do with the Pink.
Was one an evening release? I recall we'd only ever got one when we visited family close to sunderland after the match, picking it up on the way home on the night.
It's a big blow ........ we used to buy one after the matches at Roker and pass it round the car as we drove back to Mansfield.
Trying to recall if my dad would buy one of each. Cheers fella. Always sad when printed publications cease.
It seems the way of the world at the moment...I suppose being a committed environmentalist I should see the positives in this, but somehow I don't..
Without becoming pretentious mate, I have to say this is another nail in the sociability. We used to share the paper on the way home from the match, then it would be taken to Clipstone Welfare at night for the owld fellas. They'd look at it like it was a letter from their folks 'back home' in the NE.
I totally agree mate...Everything seems to be based around the individual or the home these days, and we are in danger of losing the art of group socialisation if things carry on the way they are..
Same with music and downloads. I'm going to be devastated when I can't buy a hardcopy anymore. It's on the horizon too. Next they'll stop printing books then world will have completely lost the plot.
Billy, we used to get either Hammel's or Gillingham's bus to the game and get off at Annfieldplain on the way back, 9 times out of 10 the Echo was on sale with a full match report by the time we got there. It was always a battle between the Echo and the Pink to see who could get on sale first.
Aye mate, we used to get off the Hammels at the King's Head & go for a few beers. Can't get a beer in there now like but you can have a swing, lol. As a boy, I grew up in the Hobson, near Burnopfield. The Echo never made it that far.
Thanks for that mate!! As an exile, every Tuesday was then the only real link that I had to what was going on for years and years. That and the midweek issues when there were match reports. Sad that it will be no more
Paper backs might be stopped, but hard backs will continue IMO - bit like vinyls you can still buy records on.
