The Aberdeen end
- The Red Read Robin
- Sep 4, 2019
- 9 min read
Updated: Sep 6, 2019
The ground is no longer there but there are still clues to its existence down Aberdeen Street. There’s a gap where the turnstiles used to be between houses 42 and 64. It can also be seen from the other side in the supermarket car park, through the high metal fence.
The old market place on a summer night is one of my favourite places in Hull. I love sitting outside of the Kingston pub ‘people watching’ and enjoying that rare view in the evening sun as it moves west lighting up the Holy Trinity Church roof before crossing Trinity Square.
On the left you can see the imposing 150 feet front tower and two of the four clock faces. One of the few medieval buildings left in the city, it was built by Edward I in the 1300’s and during Hull’s year as the UK’s ‘City of Culture’ (2017) was awarded minster status. The market square also benefited from the city centre public realm makeover.
On the right is the white Trinity House building with its decorative coat of arms, this grade 1 listed building was built in 1753 and lies on Trinity House Lane and Posterngate. Across the market square with its new mirror pool features is another historic building, the Grammar School, now open as a museum.
…since the 1300’s
I began chatting to Tim about rugby league, a young six feet two inch Australian, he was passionate about the game and had been working with Hull FC and Hull Kingston Rovers as a part of a degree course at the university. He found the intense rivalry between the supporters different to what he was used to back home and having seen a Hull derby had experienced the mutual hatred on a match day.
Home was Queensland who competes at the pinnacle of rugby league. Known as the Maroons they contest an annual three game ‘test series’ against rivals New South Wales Blues, (NSW) known as the ‘State of Origin’.
This game is unlike any current fixture in England since the demise of the Lancashire, Yorkshire and Cumbria county challenges and is as tough as any in the rugby codes. Both states could easily represent Australia in their own right, such is the talent available.
In 1982 about ten years before Tim was born the Australian (Kangaroos) tourists had convincingly beaten Great Britain and New Zealand, setting a new standard for the game to follow. The following year the Maroons beat NSW two games to one. A European tour was arranged for them which would include games against Wigan, Leeds and Hull Kingston Rovers.
I just happened to mention this Queensland tour and that they lost a game against Rovers. ‘Never, are you mad? …I’m going for cigarettes’ he sneered. He probably thought I was winding him up and off he went to the late shop, 150 yards away around the corner on Silver Street, next to Hepworth’s arcade. He’d be gone a while so I looked after his pint.
I wasn’t surprised that he felt this way; the state of Queensland is thirteen times bigger than England and the team is not a club side. With a population four million, they would normally be too strong due to the depth of talent they could draw upon.
Australian rugby league was a full-time professional sport and unlike today English Rugby League was still part time. Most of the Hull KR team had day jobs, training and playing during their spare time.
I began to reminisce about that afternoon meandering a bit in the process; the game was played at the old Craven Park, down Holderness Road on the site of Morrisons supermarket. The old tram sheds were still there at the front of the ground, facing Holderness Road, they reflected the progressive Victorian days when Hull had a tram system.
From 1876 the network serviced the City’s main routes along Anlaby and Hessle roads going west, Beverley Road for the north, with Hedon and Holderness roads covered for the east. The Aberdeen Street’s depot provided an ideal stopping point for Rovers fans.
On the left you can see the imposing 150 feet front tower and two of the four clock faces. One of the few medieval buildings left in the city, it was built by Edward I in the 1300’s and during Hull’s year as the UK’s ‘City of Culture’ (2017) was awarded minster status. The market square also benefitted from the city centre public realm makeover.
Rugby and even football players across the country would have travelled with their supporters on trams and trolley buses. Their connection with the fans was something very special compared to now and limited film footage adds to the nostalgia.
I’ve always been interested to hear the stories about sportsmen from those past eras. As a child I’d read about football legends such as Stanley Mathews, Tom Finney, Hull City hero Raich Carter and pre-war stars like Joe Mercer, Wilf Mannion.
I particularly remember an interview with Tommy Lawton at his home in Nottingham where he settled at the end of his career. He was brought up at Burnley to be a tough centre forward, remarking that when they did heading drills, they had to hit a mark drawn on a wall. If they didn’t jump high enough to head the ball correctly a stick would be used.
He said with a wry smile ‘I didn’t miss many’.
Like his peers his career was badly disrupted by the Second World War and this was after being the top scorer in England’s top flight for two consecutive years as a teenager. He won the league 1938-39 with Everton and then missed six seasons, although like many other footballers they played to entertain the public, keeping spirits up during the conflict.
Tommy was the replacement for the ageing William Ralph (Dixie) Dean, the Lionel Messi of his day who scored 473 goals in just 502 games in a period when the British leagues were considered to be the best in the world.
In 1980 Bill Shankly, the manager who helped transform Liverpool FC from the second division into the global football club they are today, described Dixie as “The greatest centre forward there will ever be. His record of goal scoring is the most amazing thing under the sun. He belongs in the company of the supremely great, like Beethoven, Shakespeare and Rembrandt.”
He was also a born leader, on the 1932 Everton tour to Germany in front of Herman Goering and other senior members of the Nazi party at Dresden he stopped his team joining in the Nazi salute during the national anthem. He then proceeded to score a hat-trick.
Dean received the FA Cup in 1933 from the Duchess of York, who became the Queen Mother. As I reflected I remembered that almost half a century later, another player classed as the greatest in his chosen sport, Hull KR’s Roger Millward also received a cup from her, the Rugby League Challenge Cup in 1980.
Dixie never owned a car travelling to games by tram, in his day players earned just a bit more than the average fan and would have to seek work after retiring, this in spite of being a national treasure.
A few years before his death Dixie told journalist John Roberts the story of meeting American Baseball legend Babe Ruth. They had very similar working class back grounds and hit the heights of their sports almost in parallel. Ruth hit sixty home runs for the New York Yankees in 1927 and Dixie scored sixty goals in 1927-28 in England’s top division.
However, as far as payment went it was different, Babe Ruth earned $70,000 in 1935, the equivalent of about $1,250,000 now. In the interview Dixie recalled him saying ‘You’re that Dixie Dean guy! Jeez, you’ll get some cash today’ said Ruth referring to the big crowds at football.
He was staggered to hear that Dixie would only earn £8.00 per week, about £400 per week today.
‘Jesus Christ’ exclaimed Ruth; ‘I’d demand two thirds of the gate money’.
In England they had a maximum wage and it meant that the players didn’t get too much more than the average fan. This continued until Jimmy Hill as chairman of the Professional Footballers' Association successfully campaigned for an end to the football league's maximum wage in 1961.
It had previously kept a strong connection with the fans and in the interview with Tommy Lawton he evoked those pleasant memories of what is now a romantic ideal of players travelling on trams to games and mixing with supporters.
He recalls as a 17- year old taking the number 4A tram from Liverpool Lime Street to Goodison Park. Tommy was asked by a conductor…’you’re young Lawton aren’t you? ...he replied ‘yes’...the conductor followed up with ‘you’ll never be as good as Dixie’...Tommy thought ‘that’s a lovely reception that is, charming’…
I’d imagine similar banter with Rovers fans making their way to the match, passing East Park, along to Craven Park and the Aberdeen Street stop.
Great Britain internationals like Wilf McWatt and Alec Dockar would have done the same on the way to games like the rare 0-0 draw against a top Huddersfield side in March 1947. We were reminded of Alec when his great grandson Zach Dockar Clay, a New Zealander also of Maori descent joined the Robins for a brief period in 2017.
Sadly the trams and trolley bus services finally stopped in 1964 so were long gone before the Queensland game in 1983. We walked up to Hull KR’s ex-coach and future Chairman Colin Hutton’s pub, the Zetland Arms enjoying the pre-match discussion and how we’d stand up to side who could have legitimately called themselves the best in the world.
Afterwards we entered the eastern stand via the Aberdeen Street turnstile. The houses were built in the 1890’s when Rovers were still at the Craven Street ground and ran alongside the back of the ‘railway stand’ or as my friend Paul called it ‘The Aberdeen End’.
You’d come in behind three old railway carriage bodies which had been decommissioned before ending up at Craven Park in 1948. Designed by famous railway engineer Sir Nigel Gresley two were being used as Tote boxes and one as a canteen open on a match day. The canteen one is still in existence having been restored and is held by the Great Central Carriage Group, near Banbury.
The ground is no longer there but there are still clues to its existence down Aberdeen Street. There’s a gap where the turnstiles used to be between houses 42 and 64. It can also be seen from the other side in the supermarket car park, through the high metal fence.
I went back into the bar as the night became cool and my reverie was broken when Tim eventually returned with a packet of cigarettes. He shouted across ‘I wasn’t even born in 1983 and for most of my life Rovers have been outside of the Super League, the match never happened, Hull KR are a joke’.
His demeanour had changed; maybe he’d had more than just a cigarette. People around the bar looked the other way as he span around his chair looking for a reaction. Nobody wanted to make eye contact.
I passed him his beer and explained that as I hadn’t seen Rovers 27-15 win v Australia in 1967-68 the Queensland game stood out as the greatest win I’ve witnessed, beating such a team and at a time of near total Australian dominance.
Many of the 1982 Kangaroos came from Queensland so were eligible to play for the Maroons. Artie Beetson led the team; he had close friendships in Hull particularly with Colin Hutton and his wife, due to a short but memorable stay with Rovers in 1968. Artie was a powerful ball handling forward who could have helped Rovers to silverware had he not broken his leg after just twelve performances.
Australian captain Wally Lewis now nicknamed the Emperor of Lang Park (Queensland) lead the side. He was still buoyed by the Australians 1982 tour and recent State of Origin win.
Tim shrugged and said ‘sorry but I didn’t believe you I’m not buying it, nice try’ to him it was impossibility that a provincial English rugby league team could defeat a state side from Australia.
Fed up of him by now I joined an old mate but I’d enjoyed reliving that game. Of course it happened by eight points to six… Hull born centre Mike Smith scoring Rovers winning try.
Pre-match Artie Beetson had said his team would react to any fight but they seemed to want to get their retaliation in first.
The Monday morning Yorkshire Post reported the game stating that ‘Hull Kingston Rovers earned all the glory as Queensland went down to a disgraceful defeat in a bitter and at times savage opening to their three-match tour at Craven Park’.
The following week we went to Robins and Great Britain forward Len Casey’s Bay Horse, a traditional pub just outside the city centre alongside the river Hull. That night fans and players including those from New Zealand and our Australian John Dorahy mixed together and enjoyed watching the recording on a small television set up in the bar. It was just like the old days.
Queensland couldn’t accept being beaten and wanted a rematch, it didn’t happen but they convincingly won their other two games at Wigan and Leeds.
For Rovers this was a transition period and maybe because of the rough treatment meted out by the tourists that day, like being tempered into hardened steel they created an incredible run of victories all the way the 1983-84 League title and Premiership double.
IAN BUFFEY
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