I've had a clear out and found around 40 random City programmes from 78/79 season up to 92/93 season. Seems a shame to put them in the blue bin. If anyone would like them, drop me a message. (Socially distanced) pick up from Willerby.
Not sure there are any rarities in this period. Is there any value in the seasons when we had the lowest attendances or is the value still in the oldest programmes?
The pre war programmes fetch the best prices. I know of a bloke who was given a suitcase of bound Hull City programmes from our very first season 1904/05 by an old lady who husband had died. She found them in her loft. Seemingly Hull City were Chelsea's first opponents at Stamford Bridge or as a league club, I don't know which but the programme was included in this collection and it fetched thousands of pounds at auction. He did the right thing and shared the cash with the old lady. I once bid £300 for Barcelona v Hull City from the mid 50's, it was a friendly game obviously and I thought I would be in with a shout at £300 but it went for well over £3k. Programmes from the 60's 70's and so on are only worth what the buyer wants to pay which is not far off face value. Because programmes were sold in there thousands in those days and even at the low attendance games any surplus programmes found there way into club shops or were sold off as job lots to dealers. Having said that there are some serious collectors out there.
Cheers mate, as I thought. Is there any value in City away game programmes in the 60's, I suppose that depends on collectors from the clubs we played? I have a small City collection and haven't yet started buying rarities but with interest rates so low the value of collectable rarities is rising.
Couple of pound each in good nick, if your lucky. I was in an antique shop in Beverley yesterday and they had a box full of old City programmes going back to the late 60's all priced at 50p each.
This was part of an article on Martin Spendiff that I wrote for TigerMag. "A notable game of the 1095/6 league season was to be the first game competitive football match played at Stamford Bridge, when the Tigers took on Chelsea. Although they lost 5-1, reports of the time suggest that Spendiff had a good game and wasn’t at fault. Chelsea’s massive goalkeeper William (Fatty) Foulke, who saved a penalty may have been a determining factor."
Martin Batchelor who helps run the HCSS has now finally collected the programmes of every City game dating back to the Second World War. I gave him some reserve programmes (one page team sheets) I was left by a old-time City fan relative, as I wanted the collection to be as complete as possible, and it seems these are worth a bit. If you see any single-sheet team sheet from the 1960s or earlier in a charity shop for a few pence (for any team), they are well worth picking up as some fetch quite a bit. At the HCSS we often get people gifting us programme collections in the hope that they will raise money but sadly they don't do so, as as Urika says, they were mass produced from the 60s onwards, and usually pretty well made, so many have survived in good nick. Interestingly, the biggest City programme collection reputedly used to belong to Martin Fish.
Definitely their first league game was against us. Won't have had many previous games as they were formed in a rush to have a team at Stamford Bridge as the original intention was for Fulham to play there but they turned it down. Kensington FC, Stamford Bridge FC and London FC were considered as it couldn't be named after where it was situated, Fulham. They eventually decided on naming it after the next borough, Chelsea. They were formed in The Rising Sun pub, now The Butcher's Hook which has been known to rob some of our fans.
Wikipedia strikes again, eh! According to newspaper articles of the time, Fulham were already at Craven Cottage and turned down a move. There was no rush. Chelsea were formed in March 1905 and entered the championship for 1905/06 playing their first league games away against Stockport and Blackpool in September.
There was a rush to find a team as Mears expected Fulham to move in and when they turned down the offer of it he had to find a way of getting some money in. Who said Fulham weren't already at Craven Cottage? They were London's first professional club. But Mears though they would jump at the chance of moving but was wrong.As I said, we were the first opponents in the league at Stamford Bridge.Don't know if they had played any friendlies there, but presumably they did. Don't need Wikipedia for a lot of things and not for a lot of stuff about Chelsea. Worked with a Chelsea fan who, if you met him, would have told you about them after 2 minutes. Pitch holder, owner of a very expensive history of the club bound in vellum... I remember him taking his young son to his his first game when we beat Chelsea 3-0 despite being outplayed. His son said to him you keep saying Hull are crap dad, so what does that make Chelsea?
No, you said “Definitely their first league game was against us. Won't have had many previous games” and we were not. Read your own post. Mears had a choice, he could sell the land to a railway company for a new station, but he wanted to make more money. He wanted the stadium to host big international and cup games, just like Wembley does now. So the stands were built on the soil from the railway tunnels. Now the last few bits were from the History of Stamford Bridge and local papers, as I couldn’t recall all of the details but had the links in my notes. Chelsea were formed in March 1905 and the Fulham deal collapsed in 1904. One of my mates is an Arsenal fan. Doesn’t make me an expert on the gunners does it?
We were referring to the first league game at Stamford Bridge. The original poster didn't know if it was their first game at Stamford Bridge or first game there in the league.Obviously Chelsea were formed after the Fulham deal collapsed. There wouldn't have been a need for another club to play there if it hadn't. I'll bet your mate doesn't go on about Arsenal as much as he did about Chelsea.
Reading it again, yes, didn't express it properly. Apologies. Having read Chris Elton's book I knew we had won 2 home games before losing to Chelsea.
Anyhow the programme fetched over £3k so someone thought it was significant. Here's a Chelsea fact for you. Photographs of our FA Cup 6th round 2-2 draw there in 1966 were the first colour photographs to be included in a Chelsea match programme. From memory ( I have the programme somewhere in the house) it was a European game, possibly against Bayern Munich a week or two after our match with them.
