See also List of West Ham United F.C. seasons West Ham United Football Club are based in Stratford, Newham, east London. They played home matches at the Boleyn Ground in Upton Park between 1904 and 2016, and moved to the London Stadium for the start of the 2016–17 season.
The club's formative roots stretch back to their formation as a professional side in 1900, but existed for at least five years prior to this under the name Thames Ironworks F.C. who themselves were built upon the remains of Old Castle Swifts F.C. (a club formed in 1892).
The club initially competed in the London League (Winners 1897–98) later joining the Southern League (Division 2 Champions 1898–99) and Western League (Western League Champions in 1907–08) before joining the full Football League in 1919. They enjoyed their first top flight season in 1923 and have never fallen outside the top two divisions. They have won the FA Cup three times: in 1964, 1975, and 1980, and have also been runners-up twice, in 1923 and 2006. The club have reached two major European finals, winning the European Cup Winners Cup in 1965 and finishing runners up in the same competition in 1976. West Ham also won the Intertoto Cup in 1999. The club were inaugural winners of the War Cup in 1940. Their best finish in the top flight was a third-place finish in 1986. West Ham have been runners up twice in the Football League Cup in 1966 and 1981, and shared the 1964 Charity Shield
They were awarded the 1965 BBC Sports Personality of the Year Team Award in honour of their European Cup Winners Cup win.
Early years The football club's roots lie in the shipbuilding industry of Blackwall and Canning Town, and this has contributed to West Ham's history being one of the most written about in English football. Unfortunately many of the primary sources were lost in a fire resulting from a V-1 flying bomb landing on the clubs Boleyn Ground home in 1944.
Shipbuilding roots West Ham United grew from the largest and last surviving shipbuilder on the Thames, the Thames Ironworks, which was based on either bank of the Lea, at Bow Creek where the Lea meets the Thames. The Thames Ironworks had an initial base at Leamouth, Blackwall and expanded to include a much larger site on the Canning Town side.
Blackwall, in Poplar, was traditionally part of the Tower division of Middlesex, while the Canning Town area of West Ham was then part of Essex. The repair yard of the Castle Shipping Line was a very near neighbour on the Blackwall side, and their work team, initially known as the Castle Swifts, would informally merge with the Thames Ironworks own team.
There had been a shipbuilding industry in Blackwall since at least 1485, and in 1838 the Ditchburn & Mare company moved their premises to Blackwall, taking on the yard and presumably some of the workforce of the recently closed shipbuilder William & Benjamin Wallis. By 1855 Ditchburn & Mare were bankrupt, but refinanced as the Thames Ironworks and Shipbuilding Company.
Thames Ironworks built many ships and other structures, the most famous being , and their last ship, the dreadnought, , launched in 1912
By the early years of the 20th century, Thames Ironworks was struggling to compete with northern yards which had better access to steel and other supplies while a further disadvantage was that the yard's commitment to the eight-hour day was not matched by its northern rivals.In 1910, William Thorne, MP for West Ham South addressed the Commons on this point – described in
The yard shut in 1912 but several of her ships fought in the Royal Navy during World War I. HMS Thunderer and the old armoured cruiser took an active part in the Battle of Jutland which ensured the continued blockade of Germany, which did so much to determine the course of the war. Thunderer survived unscathed but Black Prince was sunk with the loss of all 857 of her crew.
1892–1895 – Pre-history, Castle Swifts and Old St Luke's
The core of the initial Thames Ironworks, and thereby West Ham United, club originated in the remains of the bankrupt Old Castle Swifts in 1895. Old Castle Swifts had formed in 1892 as simply "Castle Swifts" at the behest of Castle Shipping Line employer Donald Currie and played their football opposite what is now the West Ham Police station. The club was the first professional football team in Essex, with players drawn from Castle Shipping Line's predominantly Scottish work force paid extra in addition to their works wages each time they made appearances for the team.
The team won the 1892–93 West Ham Charity Cup against Barking Woodville;
The team amalgamated with Old St Lukes in 1894, renaming themselves Old Castle Swifts, acquiring several players in the merger and also the tenancy of Hermit Road.
In 1895, Currie was no longer interested in bankrolling the club, and allowed the team to lapse into bankruptcy. With both the club, and their tenancy at Hermit Road now up for grabs, the philanthropic Arnold Hills (a local business owner, keen amateur sportsman, and well known enthusiast for sports, healthy living, tee-totalling, works and community orientated functions) stepped in to take up the lease and absorb some of the players into his new club including former Woolwich Arsenal player Robert Stevenson the club's first captain and player of note.
Further connections between these clubs include the continuing presence of Old St Luke's honorary secretary Mr A. C. Davis (who later served as a West Ham United director), whilst several Thames Ironworks players had also turned out on an amateur basis for Old St Luke's on several occasions (including against Castle Swifts prior to their merger).
The Castle Swifts colours were re-used on several occasions by the Thames Ironworks team as an alternative to their traditional Oxford Blue kit.
1895–1900 – Thames Ironworks F.C. and the legacy of Arnold Hills
The club was founded in 1895 as the works side Thames Ironworks F.C. by Thames Ironworks and Shipbuilding Co. Ltd company chairman Arnold Hills and works foreman Dave Taylor (who also worked as a local league referee). It was announced in the Thames Ironworks Gazette in June 1895 under the heading "The importance of co-operation between workers and management" in an effort to "wipe away the bitterness left by the recent strike":
Arnold Hills had joined the board of the company in 1880 at the age of twenty-three, and eventually progressed to the position of managing director. During this time the company had grown producing ironclads and steam ships (such as HMS Albion) and already had a fine history of working government contracts (producing HMS Warrior in 1860 for instance). However, they also suffered through a period of unionised dock strikes (1889, 1890, 1891) that stretched from the boilermakers to engineers, joiners and labourers on issues of pay, working hours and safety. The use of scab labour further lowered the workforce's opinion of Hills and in 1892 he faced considerable pressure from management and workforce alike to find some recourse.
In direct response to this he began a series of initiatives that (little to his knowledge) would have further reaching consequences than improving workplace morale. Hills already sponsored cricket, running, rowing and cycling teams and went on to add a full works brass band, operatic society, ambulance corps and even a debating society in an attempt to improve works relations after these several years of tense stand-offs and strike action. He also initiated a 'Good Fellowship' scheme that featured bonus pay on top of wages. After a serious strike in 1897 he took it upon himself to negotiate directly with his workers, circumventing the Unions and cutting their power and influence off at the root, and implemented a profit-sharing system as well as reduced working hours. The works still experienced strike action despite his best efforts in the years after but never to the same extent.
Following the success of the 1895 FA Cup Final between West Bromwich Albion and Aston Villa, the growth of local sides and the success of competitions such as the London League and the West Ham Cup he took more readily to the suggestion of a true works football team as a method of further improving morale. There had been for some years a Thames Ironworks Juniors side (formed in 1892) that had amassed 75 victories from 81 matches, providing a solid grounding of young talent, along with several former Castle Swift players such as David Furnell, Johnny Stewart, George Sage, John Woods, George Gresham and Walter Parks (some of whom were employees of the ironworks) to create a starting eleven.
Hills made enough funds available for the formation of the team, contributed the club's first kit, an all navy blue strip, and saw a fine opportunity to take up the ground rent of the recently dissolved Old Castle Swifts at Hermit Road. Taylor duly spent the summer of 1895 recruiting players and arranging fixtures.
Hills was a former Oxford Blue in cricket, AAA one-mile champion, and an accomplished association football player. He played in the 1877 FA Cup Final for Oxford University and earned a Corinthians cap for England against Scotland in 1899. He was also a devout Christian, philanthropist and promoter of teetotalism and vegetarianism. Hills was the first President of the London Vegetarian Society (1888) serving alongside the young Mahatma Gandhi on the executive committee.history of London vegetarian society http://londonvegansocieties.com/tag/gandi/ He was involved in many other vegetarian ventures including being the first President of the Vegetarian Cycling and Athletic Club, a club which continues to this day.
As a member of the temperance movement, he regularly preached the evils of alcohol drinking. At least initially, some players were "tee-totallers" and the team was reported as such in several journals (and pushed by Mr Hills in society as such a thing). As a result, Hills is also responsible for the origin of the club and players first "nickname." Notably, some years later, Hills, after his influence had waned, was to offer to clear the club's debts if each player swore temperance.
Dave Taylor went back to refereeing prior to the start of the season after sorting out the initial round of friendlies, so for the first season the club's first coach was company employee A. T. (Ted) Harsent, with the Francis Payne (secretary of Thames Ironworks company) taking up the role of chairman and Chief Director. Tom Robinson took up the role of trainer and physio, a position he had held with Old Castle Swifts.
Mr. Hills' initial concept was for a purely amateur team for the benefit of works employees. Each who wished to take part paid an initial annual stipend of 2s/6d (12.5p) and attracted fifty would-be players for the first season alone. Such was the response that a dual schedule of games was arranged to cater for the number of players, with often entirely different line-ups taking to the field at the same time. Training took place on Tuesday and Thursday nights in a gas-lit schoolroom at Trinity Church School in Barking Road. Training mainly consisted of Army physical training exercises led by Tom Robinson. They also went for runs along the Turnpike Road now known as Beckton Road. The state of amateurism was to become a bone of contention between Arnold Hills and directors due to the growing professionalism of football as espoused by future manager Syd King in 1904:
The team played on a strictly amateur basis for 1895 at least, with a team featuring a number of works employees. Thomas Freeman was a ships fireman and Walter Parks, a clerk. Johnny Stewart, Walter Tranter and James Lindsay were all boilermakers. Other employees included William Chapman, George Sage and Fred Chamberlain, as well as apprentice riveter Charlie Dove, who was to have a great influence on the club's future at a later date.