Quote ="JonM"Interesting stuff.
I wrote the original version of that history article in about 1995, based on no original research whatsoever and any errors in it are my fault. Amazing how long it's persisted and good that it's been updated.
Do you know how the 1873 date first came about? I seem to recall that the club had centenary celebrations in 1973, so it's an error that's been around for a while?'"
From what I can see, the 1873 date first seems to have got mentioned during the mid-1930s, which of course is the first time the club had any regular success.
For instance the WIdnes Carnival brochure of 1932 has a history of the club but leaves the formation details vague. But as we kept getting to Wembley and the status of the club was increasing, the demand probably arose for a "definitive" date so I suspect a few old-timers were asked and they came up with this guess.
Once you print something like this as "fact" it just gets accepted as so but I was always a bit suspicious because the Centenary Booklet and any other history of the club I've ever read has had absolutely zero evidence of this date and no info at all about those first few years.
It took me a week or two camped out in the Colindale newspaper library in London to unearth this nugget!
