Clubs rare season archive

[Auchinleckian]

There's been some interesting debate on here recently about what constitutes a real rarity of a programme, and the price that would be "appropriate" to purchase such a programme. I use the term appropriate lightly as it's always down to an individual as to whether or not they wish to bid whatever they want.
Am thinking it might be an idea if we start an archive on this forum, for reference, tht encompasses which clubs' programmes in a particular season are harder to come by than normal?
For instance, Northampton 65-6 and Carlisle 74-5 are highly sort after because of them being their only seasons in the old first division. Bradford Park Avenue 69-70, Barrow 71-2, etc are last seasons in the league so are also well known. But which seasons are harder to physically find?
My home town team, Grimsby had a magnificent programme for 3 seasons in the 1950's, 52-3, 53-4, and 54-5, affectionately called the "Orange Mariner" These are like the proverbial rocking horse poo to find, much more so than even those from their last seasons in division one straight after the war, 46-7 and 47-8.
Are there any other clubs with such seasons? And, is it worthwhile formatting it into something like Programme Monthly did with their "Earliest Known Issues" a number of years back?

[ForestMick]

John,
I think this is a brilliant idea, and exactly the reason I joined the forum, to learn things like this from people like you.
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[foxes1]

I have found in the past that Chelsea aways from the season they won the old 1st division in 1954/55 fetch high prices, the homes though seem to be a lot less.

[craig]

Yeah, ive seen Chelseas away against Cardiff for their Championship winning season go for £250

[surfinjim]

Chelsea away at WBA 54/55 went for £700 at auction 18 months ago!!!

Jim
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26th December 1979

Bolder, Blackhall, Williamson, Smith, Pickering, Hornsby, King, Johnson, McCulloch, Mellor, Curran.

Scorers; Mellor, King, Curran, Smith (pen)

GODS EVERY ONE OF THEM!

[pompeypete]

Pompey rare Programmes.

A few I can think of are:-
46/47 H v Man utd

48/49 A v bolton

60/61 FLC single sheets v Man. city & chelsea

Floodlight Challenge cup
55/56 v Brentford
58/59 v Luton Both single sheets

All go for £200, up to £500 for the Utd programme.
Others must be the postponed programmes
46/47 H v Wolves, A v Sheff Utd & Man Utd
47/48 H v Arsenal

3 Postponed I still need are
58/59 H v Newcastle
Middlesbrough (H 60/61) & (A 65/66)

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[Auchinleckian]

There seems to be a consensus, despite only being posted for a couple of hours that this might be a good idea?
If that's the case then we would need assistance from the administrators to make it happen. I suppose it's old age, but I assumed that most folk knew that the likes of Chelsea aways from 54-5 were very collectable? If not, then there's a fair bit of work to do?
It's easy enough to determine which clubs collectable seasons are governed by certain events, ie first and last seasons, doubles, trebles, championship / FACup winning seasons - albeit it would be handy to have something like that for every club?
What I'm really looking for though are those seasons for clubs, like the Orange Mariners at Grimsby, that for no logical reason are the most colelctable to be applied across the piece. Some clubs may not have them. Others like the smaller provincial clubs will be very difficult to get hold of in the immediate post war era.
Some clubs will be collectable by season because they printed very few programmes during a particularly bad season. What season was that? If that's the case, how come certain clubs like Wigan, who played before 3 or 4,000 in the 60's in the Cheshire League, are not now hugely collectable with being in the Premiership? I know that they, Peterborough, Hereford and Headington are all collectable from the mid 50's backwards, but are there seasons apart from that which we don't know about?
Debate, please...

[kcs]

From my experience the more difficult Leeds home seasons for no reason are 60/61 although this was Revie's first season in charge.

Leeds fifties tend to be difficult to find but 51/52 tend not to come around too often.

1949/50 are a minimum of 50 quid a pop

My personal favourite is 47/48 because of the design on the cover.... strange ah!!

1946/47 seems expensive, both Chelsea and Brentford are around the 400 quid mark.

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Leeds aways I am not 100% sure on, but know 59/60 has a few little gems hidden within such as Blackburn!!

Strangely 83/84 and 84/85 both home and away are slightly higher than normal????????????????
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[Posh1959]

Peterborough homes pre 52-3 are very difficult, they had large crowds but the paper quality of the programme was poor.
They played Hull in a testimonial 50/51 season and issued a more glossy programme as a one off, this programme is very common, but does not stop some dealers putting a £30 ticket on it.
You have to remember even though Peterborough pre 52 are hard to come across, the amount of people willing to put their hands deep into their pockets are few and far between as the 3 or 4 serious collectors are nearly complete back to the war.

[Posh1959]

KCS
Leeds away at Blackburn 59/60 has fetched up to £80 in the past, but I have seen a couple of copies sell in the last few months for £25 ish.

The last Blackburn v Leeds 46/7 which i saw sell fetched in excess of £500
Most of the early to mid 50s at Ewood do come around but due to the Leeds factor sell for £50 plus with the exception of 54/5 which I believe to be a £10 programme.

Who knows when it comes to Blackburn programmes over the past month 61/2 v Ipswich has sold on ebay for £134 and today £44.54 both in similar condition. Chelsea 63/4 has also dropped from £150 plus to £80. Thankfully i bought them all the 60s and mid to late 50s moons ago.

[ashburton-grove]

If I can chip in here and give you Arsenals rare season.
It would be 1946/47- (1939/40 and 1940/41).
For 1946/7 season, prices usually average £50 upto £100 for Man Utd and a friendly against Leicester. Whereas 1945/46 are about £20 each and 1947/8 £10 each. I get 1930's for £40 so you can see the difference.
The reason these are more is that it was obviously the first season after the war with attendances ranging erratically from 28000 to 63000. The paper quality was poor too, compared to Spurs programmes from the year earlier, where we shared their ground and programme printers.

The other years are 1939 until 1941 where the programmes are so rare they go for whatever you have in the bank at the time!
On 30th Nov 1940 only 761 turned up to see The Arsenal play Crystal Palace at WHL.

If anybody has any, call me first!!!!!!!
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[Auchinleckian]

There's a wealth of knowledge out there just awaiting to be tapped into. Not necessarily looking for pirces, just seasons, albeit there could be addendums to each season advising on individual programmes?
As I hinted at, the more provincial clubs have some real gems in there, far more collectable than United, Chelsea, etc. But again, that's why I'm looking at trying to idnetify which seasons, rather than prices, command premium prices.
ADMINISTRATORS? Your thoughts please about this becoming something really tangible?

[Posh1959]

Blackburn in the early 60s printed programmes in better quality paper for the directors. I was asked a few weeks ago by a southern dealer if Rovers programmes from the early 60s had been reprinted. He had one of these directors copies, I have also seen a couple of Accrington homes from the 50s with better quality paper similar to the Rovers ones. I guess they too did director copies for some if not all games.
Come on you Burnley collectors, bet you did the same?

[burnley_collector]

I'd say it's the 86/87 season for Burnley - very low attendances, therefore very low print-runs.

We won our last game of the season to stay in the League - what a difference 22 years makes!

[burnley_collector]

Posh1959 wrote:

Blackburn in the early 60s printed programmes in better quality paper for the directors. I was asked a few weeks ago by a southern dealer if Rovers programmes from the early 60s had been reprinted. He had one of these directors copies, I have also seen a couple of Accrington homes from the 50s with better quality paper similar to the Rovers ones. I guess they too did director copies for some if not all games. Come on you Burnley collectors, bet you did the same?

Not that I'm aware of, certainly there seems to be no difference in the quality of any of my early 60s homes.

[BertD]

Collectable Wimbledon are the obvious last / first seasons, but the hard to pin down ones (although by no means necessarily the most expensive to get hold of) are the 70/71 to 73/74 seasons when the team was pretty dire and attendances were plummeting. Away programmes from the same era seem equally scarce.

Particular highspots would be single sheet programmes for minor midweek league games (Mid Surrey Professional Floodlit Cup 72/73 and Premier Midweek Floodlit Cup 66/67 to 70/71). Not all are rare, but some can go for a tidy sum.
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[lambie the leap]

A relative of mine was a Burnley director in the 1950s & 1960s and I have some of his programmes - there is no discernible difference between them and the 'bog standard' issues. Burnley home programmes since the War are generally pretty easy to obtain with obviously the odd exception. In my experience of collecting Clarets programmes - over 43 years now! - the hardest seasons to obtain a full set are 1946/47 & 1952/53. That 1st post War season contains a couple of rarities in West Ham & Tottenham, whilst the 1952/53 programmes against Blackpool & Tottenham (both 4 pagers) are notoriously difficult.

[craig]

John,

Just got back from the City - cracking result, 2-0 win to put us 1 point off the top of the league and 3rd behind West Brom and Newcastle.

What type of thing are you thinking that you would like to do on the site?

Craig

[Wulfrunian]

Dont think that theres much thats particularly rare for wolves, pre 55 get a bit rarer, bot not overly so. Surprisingly a rarer season for wolves is the first one in the old div 4, plummeting crowds change of printer mid season. The Bolton home game from then is very rare I am lead to believe as there were only a few hundred prined at most.
Have been told pre war home programmes are very rare as the paper used was of very poor quality, and many were pulped during the war for some reason. I dont go back that far with my collection so havent really looked to be honest.
As for individual programmes, Derry City in the texaco cup early 70 fetches good prices, and at home to Liverpool 46/47 when liverpool won 2 - 1 tobeat us to the title seems to fetch high prices.
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[oldbolt]

I think the rare Wolves programme in Div 4 must be against another team Wulfrunian.Bolton were in Div 4 in 87/88,Wolves second season in Div 4 when crowds were bigger.
46/47 and 47/48 are probably the two most difficult Bolton seasons but not much more so than 48/49 to 50/51.
With Bolton it is individual programmes rather than seasons that are rare.The two most recent ones that sell for over £200 are both against Tottenham in 55/56 and 60/61.The last two against Chelsea in 54/55 both sold on ebay for £77.Man Utd in 57/58 is £60 - £80.

None of Bolton's home League Cup ties are rare,Sunderland in 61/62 is £10 - £15.There are two single sheets in 73/74 against Southampton and Sunderland which make that a harder season to get a full set than others in the 70s.