In the same weekend that Rangers booked their place in the semi-final of the FA Cup against Aston Villa in February 1887, the club’s committee came together and settled on a seven-year lease for a parcel of land of up to six acres at the Copeland (sic) Road end of Paisley Road. They struck a deal with Braby and Company, a building firm from Springburn, to construct a new stadium at a cost of £750, which included a pavilion, a 1,200 capacity stand, an enclosure and a four-lane running track inside a terracing amphitheatre. In addition to the ambitious plans, a playing surface would be laid out 115 yards long by 71 wide and space was even left behind each goal for tennis courts to be introduced at a later stage. The ground, it was claimed, would be little inferior to Hampden Park, then recognised as the best sporting arena in the country.
The Scottish Athletic Journal greeted the decision of the Kinning Park committee to forge ahead with plans for a new ground in February 1887 with glee. It reported: ‘The meeting was most enthusiastic, harmonious in tone and unmistakenly evidenced the deep desire of the Light Blues to take a higher stand in the football arena than they have hitherto done.’1 However, only three years earlier it had foreseen only doom and gloom if Rangers ever moved from Kinning Park. In March 1884 it warned: ‘The Rangers have received notice to quit Kinning Park as the ground is to be immediately built upon. This is a serious blow to the Rangers – one from which they will scarcely recover. It almost certainly means extinction. Dissociate the Light Blues from Kinning Park and the club will soon collapse. One cannot think of the Rangers associated with any other park and grounds situated so near the city as Kinning Park is are not to be had.’2 However, a sub-committee under the guidance of convenor Dan Gillies was formed for the purpose of raising the necessary funds in the spring of 1887. The fears of the Journal would soon prove unfounded.
It may not have boasted a line up to match Sunday Night at the London Palladium, but the fundraising concert for the first Ibrox Park at the Waterloo Rooms was a roaring success.
Rangers hoped the bulk of the finance would come from money already at hand and the following season’s gate receipts, but fundraising was also crucial. To that end they organised a benefit concert at the Grand Hall of the Waterloo Rooms in Wellington Street in Glasgow city centre, with Tom Vallance acting as compère. The bill promised acts such as Cinderella, from the Gaiety Theatre pantomime, celebrated tenor Peter Kerr, eminent soprano Isa Grant and Irish comedian Dan Rogers. There was something for everyone, including an American music band, The Dobsons, and even a French equilibrist, Monsieur Trewey, whose trick involved walking along tightropes. Rangers also got the financial balancing act spot on – the night was a complete sell-out, a roaring success. The licence for the Grand Hall was extended to 2am to allow dancing into the night and, with ticket prices of sixpence and a shilling, the club coffers were swollen substantially and concerns eased that the move was a step too far for an organisation that was still just 15 years old.
These days, with its excellent transport links and relative proximity to Glasgow city centre, Ibrox is the perfect home for Rangers geographically, not to mention the strong spiritual links which have been forged with the district for over a century. However, in the 1880s the move to the relative backwater was considered a risk, but it was championed by the club’s honorary secretary Walter Crichton, who foresaw the spread of the booming city further westwards. Glasgow had overtaken Edinburgh in terms of the size of its population as early as 1821 and by the time of the formation of Rangers in 1872 it was home to approximately 500,000 people, which had become almost 660,000 by 1891.
For much of the second half of the 19th century Ibrox was still a rural district – in 1876, fields of corn grew to the very fringes of Clifford Street, which runs parallel between Paisley Road West and the M8 over a century later. An outward sign of the growth and prosperity of the district in the 1870s came with the construction of the original Bellahouston Academy, which still stands today on Paisley Road West near its junction with Edmiston Drive. Districts such as Bellahouston, Dumbreck and parts of Ibrox were home to the well-to-do and they shuddered at the prospect of sending their children across the ever sprawling city for a premier education at Glasgow Academy, situated in the west end, and as a result Bellahouston Academy was formed.
Understandably, given its rural status, the history of Ibrox has tended to be overlooked, certainly in comparison to its near neighbour Govan, once the fifth-largest burgh in Scotland. The oldest recorded mention of the place name now so closely associated with Rangers is Ibrokis, in 1580, and Ybrox in 1590. Indeed, in the 19th century there were still people who lived in and around the district that pronounced it as ‘Eebrox’. The name is believed to come from the Gaelic broc, meaning badger, and I or Y, an old Celtic word for island. According to local lore, a water trough stood just off the head of what is now know as Broomloan Road, with its spring water origins at Bellahouston Hill. The water was so plentiful it occasionally spilled over to join the Powburn, a sluggish stretch of water that meandered through Drumoyne and into the Clyde at Linthouse. A swampy island populated by badgers was formed at the Broomloan Road site where the two stretches of water met, hence Ybrox or Ibrox, the island of the badgers.
In more recent times, the land around Edmiston Drive now associated with the home of Rangers was field and meadowland. There were two large houses on the area now recognised as Bellahouston Park – Bellahouston House, sometimes called Dumbreck House, owned by a famous Govan family, the Rowans. Another estate nearby was known as Ibrox or Ibroxhill and was owned by the Hill family, partners in Hill and Hoggan, the oldest legal firm in the city. Both estates were bought by Glasgow town council in 1895 for £50,000 and within 12 months had been absorbed into the city boundaries, opening their gates as Bellahouston Park.
An historical delve into the origins of the names of Edmiston Drive and Copland Road might also intrigue fans. The former was named after Richard Edmiston, a senior partner in the auctioneer firm J. and R. Edmiston, who operated at West Nile Street for much of the first half of last century. Edmiston’s family home, Ibrox House, was in the shadows of the second Ibrox Park and he was bestowed the honour when the street on which the stadium now stands was first opened. He appeared to have had a philanthropic nature and in 1949 was even named a freeman of Girvan, where he owned a holiday home, after gifting the local museum several paintings by leading artists of the time.
Copland Road was named in the first half of the 19th century after a writer, William Copland, in tribute to the fact that his principal residence was at Dean Park Villa, at the west side of the thoroughfare near its junction with Govan Road. The name of the street was correctly spelled out in maps and journals of the time, but was later changed to Copeland Road after a spelling blunder by builders who were constructing the local Copland Road School. The erroneous letter ‘e’ was allowed to stand unchallenged for much of the first half of the 20th century, but the street name has long since been restored to the original.
If the few residents who lived in the Ibrox district at the time of the Rangers’ arrival had some reservations about their new neighbours, they were probably well founded. A few months before the move, the Scottish Athletic Journal was forced to take Rangers fans to task, not for the first time, for their behaviour at a match, this time against Third Lanark. It reported: ‘There were several of the Kinning Park rowdies at Cathkin on Saturday. Some of them seemed proud of their swearing abilities as they took advantage of every lull in the play to volley forth a few choice oaths which were heard all over the field. It is a pity an example cannot be made of some of these people.’3 Rangers toyed with the idea of taking over the lease of a ground in Strathbungo at a rent of £80 a year and the Journal warned that rents in the area would immediately go through the floor. Perhaps Tom Vallance summed it up best of all at the cake and wine banquet for VIP guests the Wednesday before the official opening of the new Ibrox ground. He addressed the throng and admitted that Kinning Park was not always a place for the faint-he
arted. He said, ‘A certain stigma rested on the club owing to their field being in a locality not of the best, while the spectators of the game were not always of the best description, though they were simply such as the locality could afford. I have known very respectable people come to our matches and not renewing their visits but that has all gone and I am sanguine that in our new sphere we will be able to attract to our matches thousands of respectable spectators.’4 His claims proved prophetic, as almost a year after the opening of the first Ibrox Provost Ferguson of Govan admitted there had been initial private misgivings among the burgh’s leading citizens over the arrival of the Light Blues in their district. However, he lavished praise on the Rangers fans, noting there had not been a single arrest in their first season. The Scottish Umpire gushed: ‘It is satisfactory to have such a testimony from the chief magistrate of such a football constituency as Govan as to the law abiding and peaceful character of the crowds which patronise the pastime.’5
Bad behaviour was not restricted to Kinning Park. Indeed, one of the most ugly and unsavoury incidents of the period involved Queen’s Park, following a 3–0 defeat to Preston in the FA Cup in October 1886 at Hampden. There were 14,000 at the game, including 500 from England, and the crowd invaded the field near the end to attack the visitors following a hefty challenge on star player William Harrower by Preston inside-forward Jimmy Ross, younger brother of former Hearts star Nick. Queen’s players were forced to leap to the defence of helpless Preston players as they were attacked by sticks and umbrellas as they made their way through the throng to the safety of the pavilion. Ross later ordered a cab to take him away from Hampden but ‘the vehicle was stormed and Ross was severely maltreated.’6
Nevertheless, despite its occasionally disreputable status, there was still a fondness for the old ground at Kinning Park that was exemplified by the turnout of former players to mark the end of its life as a sporting arena on Saturday 26 February 1887, days before the landlord turned the key on the gates for good. Rangers had tried – and failed – to lure Nottingham Forest and Blackburn Rovers north to play an exhibition match to mark the occasion, but it was perhaps more appropriate to field the moderns against the ancients, although the last-minute nature of the arrangements restricted the number of fans in attendance. Old boys such as Tom and Alick Vallance, George Gillespie, Sam Ricketts and William ‘Daddy’ Dunlop all turned out and, although Moses McNeil did not feature on the park, the picture taken before the game shows him sitting proudly with his former colleagues, who were unlucky to lose 3–2 to the younger and fitter Light Blues.
Kinning Park closed for good on 26 February 1887 with a game between the ancients and the moderns. The ancients included players such as Tom and Alick Vallance, George Gillespie, Sam Ricketts and William ‘Daddy’ Dunlop. Moses McNeil (seated second row, far left, with cane) attended but did not play. The moderns won 3–2.
Rangers were left to see out the last three months of the 1886–87 season as nomads, with ‘home’ games played at venues such as Cathkin Park, Hampden and Inchview (Partick Thistle’s ground at the time, in the Whiteinch district), while their soon-to-be near neighbours at the other end of Copland Road, Whitefield, offered their own Whitefield Park ground for training purposes, which was gratefully accepted. Throughout the spring and summer work continued unabated on the new ground, while the Rangers committee set about organising a grand opening that would later lead the Scottish News to comment: ‘The usually quiet district of Ibrox has never before witnessed such an assemblage.’7
The Rangers committee succeeded in persuading Preston North End to travel north to open their new ground. The visitors demanded a £50 appearance fee, a fair deal for Rangers on the back of eventual gate receipts of £340. The Lancashire side, under manager Major William Sudell, became known as the Invincibles, with a team consisting predominantly of Scots who were among the first professionals in the fledgling sport. Players such as Nick and Jimmy Ross, David Russell, John Goodall and Geordie Drummond earned a fortune – comparatively speaking – as Preston won the first English League championship in 1888–89 without losing a game and clinched the double by going all the way in the FA Cup without conceding a goal. They also won the League in 1890, so Rangers fans were watching legends in the making as they turned up at Ibrox that August afternoon.
Rangers were keen to show off their new ground to a select audience ahead of the formal opening and 150 invites were sent out to dignitaries to attend the cake and wine preview the Wednesday before the Preston game (it was also a chance for Vallance to meet the VIPs ahead of his own big match with Marion Dunlop, which forced him to miss the game on the Saturday). On the Tuesday night, a Rangers team playing under the guise of the Ibroxonians fought out a 2–2 draw with Whitefield at Whitefield Park as they prepared for Preston, although the Light Blues could only muster eight men to start the game. Not surprisingly, the atmosphere at the cake and wine was jovial as the club was complimented for the quality of a facility few in British football could boast. Mr Luther, of builders Braby and Co., even noted that the sharp corrugated fencing around the ground would prevent fans from watching without paying for the privilege, as it made for an uncomfortable seat for supporters keen to snatch an illicit view of their favourites. Behind the scenes, preparations continued to accommodate fans from all over the city at the new ground. The Rangers committee asked for the 6 o’clock train to Wemyss Bay to make a temporary stop at Ibrox to allow fans easier access to the new site, while the Glasgow Tramway Company agreed to run additional brakes from the city to Paisley Road at only twopence a head. In terms of pre-match entertainment, the Scottish Umpire somewhat snootily noted: ‘The Fairfield Band offered to assist the Govan Police Band and Pipers at the opening ceremony. Declined regretfully. It is a football match, not a band contest.’8
The game and the opening of the new ground had clearly captured the public’s imagination and, while the event was as popular as all associated with the club could have hoped, the capacity crowd of 20,000 revealed severe organisational problems. Time was called on the action five minutes early amid scenes of chaos, even though many supporters had already given up and headed for home, setting a 19th-century precedent for the 21st century’s so-called Subway Loyal, who turn for the exits as soon as the hand of the Ibrox game clock reaches out to touch 80 minutes. Even the prophecy by Mr Luther of Braby and Co., who cheerfully predicted no climbing on the perimeter fencing, was wide of the mark. The Scottish News lamented that the capacity, by kick-off time of 4pm, was ‘taxed to its utmost. There was scarcely standing room. Many spectators eager to obtain a good view mounted on the top of the corrugated iron fencing, on the sharp end of which they must have had a most uncomfortable seat. The stand was full to overflowing.’9
The pain of the posteriors of the Light Blues legions was nothing compared to the assault on their eyes as Preston opened the scoring after only two minutes through Goodall and raced to a 5–0 lead by half-time. Goodall, born in London to Scottish parents and raised in Kilmarnock, notched up at least four goals (even the papers of the time stopped naming the North End scorers after a while). The Lancashire cracks had just scored their eighth goal, right near the end, with only a solitary response from Andy Peacock, when the game was ended prematurely.
Seven minutes from time, as Rangers mounted a rare attack, fans who had been forced by weight of numbers onto the track around the field crowded to the touchlines for a closer look. Inevitably, spectators spilled on to the field itself, crowding the players in the process. The players eventually made their way through the throng to the safety of the dressing rooms. Rangers were victims of their own success, and claims by the builders for a capacity of 20,000 were clearly straining credulity as thin as the patience of the Preston party, who were understandably upset by the conduct of the crowd. The News explained: ‘The accommodation outside the railings was found to be too limited and the officials were obliged to allow the spectators to go inside on the track, which made room for thousands demanding ad
mission. The spectators, evidently weary of a very slow game, began to troop out of the game some 15 minutes before the allotted time had run. The policy of allowing the people in on the track proved a fatal one, as the crowd who stood there gradually edged their way in on the field of play and finally all control was lost over them. Before the game was concluded the police tried in vain to clear the spectators off the field. The Rangers coming close on the visitors’ goal was the last straw as the people fairly swarmed round the players and the field was a black mass of living beings. It was no use now to attempt further play and the game came to an abrupt close five minutes from time. The players were followed into the pavilion and some were cheered. Others, especially Goodall, being hooted.’10
Surprisingly, few pictures exist of the first Ibrox Park, but these line drawings, from contractors Fred Braby and Co., appeared in the press ahead of the official opening against Preston North End in August 1887. The gent enjoying a smoke is standing at what today would be the Copland Road stand.
Rangers hosted Preston at the official banquet that evening in the favoured restaurant of the Light Blues, Ancell’s in Glassford Street. In the absence of Vallance, it was left to vice-president Peter McNeil to address the players and officials and he enthused about the strides the club had made in the previous 15 years and the hopes for a new era symbolised by the new ground. Not surprisingly, the on-field events of a few hours earlier merited only a passing remark. McNeil said, ‘I have been a member of the Rangers since it was ushered into the world and I cannot recollect an event which will bear comparison with the event we have been celebrating today and which has ended so gloriously for the club…we, as a club, have reason to congratulate ourselves on the splendid success that has attended the opening ceremony…there was, it is true, a curiosity shared by all to see the new ground but what attracted so large a crowd was the reputation of the North End more than the novelty that surrounded our enterprise. I am expressing the sentiments of every member of the committee when I say that we are deeply grateful to the North End for coming at this time and should it ever turn out that building extensions force them from Deepdale to some other ground the Rangers, if they are asked, will willingly go to Preston and perform the part that has been so well performed by the North End today. There is no need to say much about the game. It was played in a spirit of honest rivalry and with a true appreciation of the finer points of the game…I again express the wish that this day, which is undoubtedly the most memorable in the history of the club, will be followed by results, financial and physical, that will place the Rangers in a position that will be the envy of many and the possession of few.’11
The Gallant Pioneers: Rangers 1872 Page 19