The White City Stadium

Today's history lesson, enjoy.
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Focus On | The White City Stadium

By: Ron Norris Published: 29 July 2012



As the Olympics gets under way in Stratford it brings to mind the last arena built for such an occasion. Sited on the other side of London it was one that ended up being home to QPR on two occasions.

The 1908 Olympics were all set to take place in Rome but when Mount Vesuvius erupted devastating Naples funds were desperately re-directed to the cause. As a result Italy could no longer afford to host and London stepped in.

The Franco-British Exhibition of 1908 had already seen a sprawling mass of palaces and exhibition buildings built in W12, attracting more than eight million visitors to an event showcasing industrial and cultural achievements. The whitewashed buildings quickly earned the area the name “White City”. With London now named the official hosts, a new Olympic stadium was added to the project.

Built in just ten months at a cost of £80,000 The White City Stadium was opened on April 27th 1908. At the time it was the largest stadium in the world seating 68,000 people with a capacity to hold 150,000. It was the first purpose built Olympic venue ever and boasted running and cycling tracks, a swimming pool as well as a pitch for football, hockey etc.

Over the years it was used for a wide range of sports and events including rugby, boxing, baseball, stock car racing and speedway, mostly though it became known for athletics and dog racing. Between 1932 and 1970 it was home to the Triple A championships whilst the Greyhound Racing Association turned it into this country’s premier dog track from 1927 right up to 1984 and hosted all the major events including the greyhound derby.

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For Queens Park Rangers the stadium provided us with two short stints in our history, both times as a result of ambitious boards who wanted the club to grow beyond the confines of a restricted Loftus Road.

Having already played at thirteen grounds in our twenty year existence we had settled down at LR in 1917 and played there up until 1931. Formally the site of amateur club Shepherd Bush FC, and little more than a field when we arrived, Rangers had outfitted the small ground with stands and turnstiles from a previous home at The Park Royal Stadium.

There is constant talk today of moving to a new, larger stadium with the current ground deemed too small for our requirements. That’s nothing new and back in the 30’s there was a similar feeling in the QPR boardroom. With the massive White City just down the road the directors gambled on building up good recent attendances with a switch to the larger site. The move took place in the summer of 1931 whilst Loftus Road was initially kept on for reserve team games with plans to sell it as soon as possible.

We played our first game in our new home on September 5th that year when just under 19,000 people watched Rangers lose 3-0 against Bournemouth. Another defeat followed and it took two months before we registered our first win at The White City when Luton Town were beaten 3-1.

The hope for a rise in attendance didn’t materialise, save for an FA Cup tie with Leeds a week later that saw us break the 40,000 barrier average gates hovered around the 12,00 mark with sub 10,000 crowds often rattling around the huge venue. This probably wasn’t helped by a poor run of form from The R’s which saw us slip down the table not helped by the long term absence of striker George Goddard who was side-lined with a long term injury early in 1932.

Despite the lack of success both on the field and in terms of gate numbers the club stuck at the project for another season in 1932/33. We began that campaign with a 3-2 home defeat to Brentford, an encouraging 24,000 turned up but once again the novelty didn’t hold.

Results were better in the second season but attendances were not. By the end of 1932 the average gate had slipped to below 10,000 and by the time February came there were less than 5,000 turning up for home games. As the season drew to a close we would play in front of under 3,000, a new low in our league history.

Poor finances were now biting the club hard with the accounts overdrawn to the tune of nearly £35,000. The players were asked to defer their wages in order to help us complete the season with a promise made to pay them in full in the summer. Luckily our fortunes were dealt a huge boost when the son of late Chairman J. H. Fielding generously agreed to waive the £20,000 owed to his estate. With the financial burden eased Rangers abandoned The White City dream and returned to Loftus Road, which fortunately for the sake of the club had never been sold as first planned. QPR promptly won seven in a row on their return to their spiritual home.

And there we stayed for the best part of thirty more years until history would somewhat repeat itself in the early 60’s. After a fantastic end to the 61/62 campaign saw The R’s lose just one their last sixteen league games the club appeared to be on the up. The board, supported by manager Alec Stock, once again decided to give The White City another try and would commence first team home games there from October 1962. As with the previous move Loftus Road was retained for reserve and youth fixtures.

The first match scheduled was postponed due to heavy rain which delayed our return to the site until October 6th 1962. This time it was Notts County who were the party poopers, coming away from the ground with a 1-0 win in a match watched by 15,594 people.

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Once again there proved to be little enthusiasm for the change, attendance figures settled around the 10,000 mark and continued to dwindle. It must have been an incredibly hollow atmosphere to be in a stadium with more than 50,000 empty spots, almost marooned from the pitch by the track and the contrast between the tight intensity of Loftus Road must have been startling. By the end of the season we finished up our run at the ground for a second and final time when Coventry brought down the curtain on our time there with a 3-1 defeat watched by just 3,245 spectators.

The White City continued to host athletics and dog racing for many years to come, the last greyhound race was held in 1984, and the site was demolished in 1985 to make way for a new BBC building which remains today. The 1908 Olympics are commemorated there by a plaque listing the medals won by each participating country and the names of all medal-winning athletes at the Games.

As for QPR, having abandoned the bigger stadium idea and returned to Loftus Road for a third and final time better luck was just around the corner. Within a year a certain Jim Gregory had joined the board and our fortunes were about to sky rocket.

The Stadium was a big part of the local area’s history but just a small footnote in ours. Loftus Road has always been our natural home and helped save the club from disaster in the 30’s. We have long been linked with another move away from our little ground, now under Tony Fernandes it seems certain that will happen and we will bid farewell to our iconic little stadium once again, this time for good.

The White City Stadium may have long gone but the ambition it represented for our club has never really disappeared.


White City Facts

QPR played 65 games at the stadium in total winning 31 of them.

Rangers scored a total of 149 goals there an average of 2.3 per game.

The White City Stadium is partially responsible for the modern marathon distance of 26 miles 385 yards when the start of the 1908 Olympic race was moved to Windsor Castle in order to give the Royal Family the best view.

A world cup game was held at the stadium in 1966 after Wembley refused to cancel a scheduled greyhound meet. France played Uruguay there in a group match.

In 1973 musician Ray Davies suffered something of a meltdown on stage during a Kinks gig, he quit the band before collapsing of a drugs overdose. He would go on to recover and re-join the group shortly afterwards.

http://www.qprnet.com/index.php/history/32-focus/135-focus-on-the-white-city-stadium

 

Yep. That's the story alright.

Fact is, regardless of population and generational demographics, Rangers' attendances have consistently ranged (pun not intended) between about 5 - 18k depending on how the team fared at any point.

That now needs to change and the only thing that can help us draw the attendances needed is a long term consistent reputation for quality players and European competition. Any less than that and the prospect of a new stadium is likely to turn out to be yet another damp squib.

 

Hi Brixton I agree with you! Unless we hit the big time a new stadium could kill our beloved Rangers.

 

Of course one of the factors that blew the White City experiments out of the water, was the distance of the crowd to the pitch...

Seems Tone and co. have taken this into consideration though.

 

Thanks for that Norway. Never went to White City despite being around during its latter days. Was always this mythical place for me connected to the Franco British Exhibition of the early 20th century, the '45 Olympics and of course Rangers. Sad all these great places have disappeared, I live near the site of the Crystal Palace Exhibition (not Palarse) and the desolate stairways and terraces of a long gone massive glass building have a certain pathos.

If only something similar could happen to Stamfo.....