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Our Bob Duncan played in the 1895 Scottish Cup final and we're very pleased to be seeing him for the first time. This amazing souvenir was included with (Aberdeen club) Bon-Accord's Football Supplement, dated 18 May 1895, some 4 weeks after the final. Photo and back story added to Bob's profile at the Archive:

Bob Duncan →

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Imagine the frustration at knowing the guy you're chasing (Hope Robertson) is in this Woolwich Arsenal line-up of 1889, but no names are listed. Followed by the absolute joy of stumbling across a chance reveal on e-bay a few months later. This was the tale of our researcher Joe Kelly; these are the small victories which keep us all going! Today, for the first time, we can now introduce you properly to...

Hope Robertson →

 

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37 minutes ago, denismcquadeno.eleven said:

This is one of my most treasured pictures. Davie McParland and Alan Rough’s signatures are here but are hard to see against their darker outfits. Alan Rough used to sign his name very clearly, smallish and both first/last name the same size. That’s how he signed when he made  the first team. Now he produces an enormous circular ‘A’ to start ‘Alan’ with ‘Rough’ inside!

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You mean like this!  John Craig, Alan Rough & Alan Hansen signed my Jags centenary book by Ian Archer when I bought it.

 

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We're very pleased to report that recent research on Jackie Husband led to confirmation of what we'd long suspected; former player and then-trainer Adam McLean was our caretaker manager in 1959, in the interim period between David Meiklejohn and Willie Thornton. All duly applied throughout the Archive today...

Adam McLean (caretaker manager) →

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Fond memories? Of those mentioned above:

Paul Wilson, Nope

Jorge Cadette, Nope

Willie Wallace, Nope

Colin Jackson, Nope

Gregor Stevens, Nope

Harry Davis, Yes

George Niven, Yes

Billy Ritchie, Nope

Stevie Chalmers, Nope (on reflection)

John Divers, Nope

Nicky Walker, Yes

Simon Donnelly, Yes (just!)

Gerry Britton, Yes

Andy Murdoch, Yes

Alex O'Hara, Yes

Kenny Watson, Yes

Billy Gibson, Yes  

Haven't included loanees, but maybe have forgotten some.

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1 hour ago, Jaggernaut said:

Fond memories? Of those mentioned above:

Paul Wilson, Nope

Jorge Cadette, Nope

Willie Wallace, Nope

Colin Jackson, Nope

Gregor Stevens, Nope

Harry Davis, Yes

George Niven, Yes

Billy Ritchie, Nope

Stevie Chalmers, Nope (on reflection)

John Divers, Nope

Nicky Walker, Yes

Simon Donnelly, Yes (just!)

Gerry Britton, Yes

Andy Murdoch, Yes

Alex O'Hara, Yes

Kenny Watson, Yes

Billy Gibson, Yes  

Haven't included loanees, but maybe have forgotten some.

What about Big Jim Slavin?

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6 minutes ago, partickthedog said:

What about Big Jim Slavin?

Well, thank you!

I was having a nice evening, chilling with a couple of beers, reminiscing about Thistle, and then.......... THIS!

Evening ruined! :shok::confused1::no:

But JS is a clear omission. So, having given the matter some additional thought....... It's a Nope for big (gigantic) Jim:sad1:

 

 

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Denis, you did well to realise that was Adam McLean the famous Celt, although it was right there all the time under your nose on the Thistle Archive! Look at the gallery tab and you'll see a picture of him related to Celtic's 2000th goal. Also, just under his name, you'll see a link to his profile as a player which lists all his clubs.

Big difference with Adam compared to the rest is that, although he was a Celtic great, he was actually a Thistle fan. By the way, there's much to explore and discover on the Archive. Did you know for example, that we list every player connection that we know about with every team. Here's what our mega-matrix throws up for the gruesome twosome:

Thistle's player connections with Rangers (129) →

Thistle's player connections with Celtic (95) →

 

In other news...

Thanks to a recent submission to the amazing Historical Football Kits, we're now getting a sense of what's possibly the first-ever Partick Thistle strip (1876-1878). It's another small piece in the hazy story of the birth of our club. The information was recorded in Charles Alcock's football annuals (1868-1906) from the time. What else lurks in those we wonder?

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1 hour ago, denismcquadeno.eleven said:

There is one thing I wish and that is that Thistle had a physical display of memorabilia, eg shirts, boots, newspaper cuttings, photos, medals (if possible.) scrapbooks, supporters’ scarves, flags, memorabilia, signed material, ephemera like cards, badges etc and importantly large boards telling the history of PTFC, for all the public  to visit and see. It would be a ‘living exhibition’ being added to all the time by people who found things in a drawer, or belonging to an old relative etc This may sound like an idea, which is a bit ‘pie in the sky’ but I’ve seen it done. It costs money to set up of course, which is a factor against, when there’s more immediate needs and things to pay for. But, your history is your ‘story’ and Thistle have 146 years of it-that’s a LOT of history! It’s a shame some things get forgotten or are not known. Of course, The Archive is one way to address that, but, seeing a match ball , shin pads, old boots or jersey from maybe sixty/seventy years ago (or more) brings it to life, as a physical, primary resource, and is very exciting in a way a book or photo can never be.

Great post mate, Thistle's history is an endlessly fascinating subject and there's still much to explore and celebrate. A permanent museum as you describe would be excellent, and I think the club did well with a couple of dummy runs recently, showcasing the 1921 and 1971 successes in the Aitken suite. Maybe they'll put something together for the 150th anniversary.

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11 hours ago, denismcquadeno.eleven said:

 (Bradford’s other side-Bradford, Park Avenue, were once managed by Celtic’s first manager’s (Willie Maley) brother Tom Maley. It was Tom Maley at BPA who changed the colours of the team, to green & white, worn to this day, with the original colours of red, amber, black as a change strip or sometimes home colours!)  

 

Denis, I'm sure that you know that Tom Maley played for the Jags. Not too long back we wrote a bio of Tom, as shown below. Afraid I can't do links, but in the Archive go to players , M, and Tom Maley. In the words of my esteem colleague,  Jack Little ( A. F. Kincaid)  "a shameless plug".)

A brilliant character. 

 

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2 hours ago, denismcquadeno.eleven said:

2) Team from 1954/55, after I had just been born. Of all the sides I never saw, this would be one I wish I’d seen but with Jimmy Walker at outside left. What a player he must have been! That team SHOULD have won silverware, no doubts!

Agreed, David Meiklejohn (best ever example of Old Firm legend turned Thistle great?) was an absolute king as manager, his boys were consistently excellent for us and he was big on cultivating Thistle mindedness. Winning 4 of the Glasgow Cups (1949 to 1954) in such a formidable footballing city was a great achievement. Took us to NINE cup finals and twice finished third in the League, truly amazing. The photie below shows Rangers coach Arthur Dixon and player David Meiklejohn with the Glasgow Charity Cup in 1934. This is the duo that would repeat this magic trick with Thistle as trainer and manager. His Thistle story needs to be written one of these days!

Partick Thistle FC honours list →

 

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Thistle managers →

With the recent confirmation of Adam McLean as caretaker manager in 1959, our managers pages got a mini re-styling. Each of the 33 now have their matches re-assuringly numbered on the foremost tab on their profile. As ever, you can click on the match result to access the individual match hub. All 6,687 matches in our history (to the end of 2021-22) are covered, and all come with our own unique potted report. The match hubs link back to the managers in each case, so you can skip back and forth when researching or just casually browsing. You'll sometimes notice that the matches where the scoreline is in "bruised purple" (e.g. Murdo MacLeod →) are not in the numbering system; these are the abandoned or voided matches which we like to include for posterity but never include in our streaks, tallies and milestones.

Season by season →

With the recent amazing discovery about the earliest-known Partick Thistle strip in 1876, each of our 148 seasons has also had a similar re-styling. As with the managers pages, the matches are all numbered for an at-a-glance understanding of the campaign, and a (brief) results summary is now included at the footer, as well as a subtle improvement to the page stylization. Some good examples to look at would be the pages where Historical Football Kits have recently added new Partick Thistle strips e.g. 1875-76 →, 1974-75 → or 1982-83 →. Again, you'll sometimes notice that the matches where the scoreline is in "bruised purple" are neither in the numbering system or included in any stats tallies.

'Bio Extra' tabs
As you may already know, we have a mini-bio for each of the ~2,000 first-team players in our history, albeit these were mostly auto-generated in rather mechanical language. We've been adding some "meat to the bone" with our 'Bio Extra' tabs and now have around 500 or so in place. We're kind of casually just adding them in whenever we have cause to be re-visiting a player's profile e.g. Ralph McElhaney →  or Mouhamed Niang →. Recently, all of our current squad members → got the 'Bio Extra' treatment, so it's worth keeping an eye on the home page news to see the latest updates. Did you know Mason McCready → was actually American and his Dad won a Superbowl winners ring in 2001? Neither did we until last week! Anyone who fancies getting involved in writing a bio paragraph or two for their favourite Jag then please do get in touch →

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16 minutes ago, denismcquadeno.eleven said:

Thistle ‘Giants’ of the past!

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That's a great quizz for Jags fans! Several are on the "tip of my tongue", so I'll wait until I've sobered up  before I embarrass myself further.

Fourth Pfizer jag at lunchtime. Sore arm, few beers, feeling  a bit like going into outer space....... see y'all next time..

Edited by Jaggernaut
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