Burnage High School opened its doors to its first pupils in 1932. By 1936 the first boys were leaving and by 1938 a sufficient number of the 1st and 2nd eleven soccer players had left the School for an Old Boys Club to be viable.

A meeting was therefore convened on 17th October 1938 in a room hired for the purpose in a house on Stockport Road, Longsight, opposite Pownalls Daisy Mill. The Daisy Mill still stands, but the birthplace of the Burnage Old Boys AFC has been demolished and replaced by more modern buildings and by an open space.

The meeting was attended by some 30 teenagers, with some of their dads, and one of the masters from the School as Chairman designate.   The presence of the elders was of great merit in keeping teenage feet on the ground and explaining that the English F.A. Amateur Cup was not just around the corner.

On that evening the Club was founded and after loud, long and abusive discussion, the title Burnage High School Old Boys Association Football Club was chosen, in preference to Old Burnageians AFC.  Old Burnageians lost out since the majority considered that few people could pronounce it, and none would be able to spell it.

Friendly matches were played for the rest of the 1938-39 season and then the Lancashire Amateur League elected the Club to membership for the 1939-40 season.

The Second World War intervened, the Lancashire Amateur League suspended its activities, the Club played friendly matches for a time, but quickly the members went off to war and the club went into hibernation for 5 years or so.

However, the School and the parents kept things on ice during that time and accumulated sufficient funds for those returning from the war to be able to start up the Club again promptly in 1946.  Regrettably, not all the pre-War members survived.

The momentum generated by the returned warriors and a number of their parents was quite amazing.  The Lancashire Amateur League commenced operations again, Burnage were still members of it, and 1946-47 saw a full season of League fixtures.

When first founded, the Club was able to play on the School 1st XI pitch, but the effect of the anchoring of a barrage balloon to a concrete block on that site persisted for some time post-war, also.  The Headmaster of the adjacent Green End Primary School very kindly allowed the use of their pitch for a while, but then it became necessary to strike out into the bold, bad world of pitches for hire.  Sojourns at the Godfrey Eamon Playing Fields in deepest Reddish, Cringle Fields in Levenshulme, Mellands Playing Fields in Gorton - various "one night stands" on Fog Lane Park, Christy and Hough End Playing Fields etc., etc. - occupied the years to 1952. In that year a pitch on The Simon Field in Didsbury became available every other week.  Burnage were running two teams, so homes venues were, for a time, split.

Very quickly, however, the pitch at The Simon Field became wholly available to Burnage. Subsequent to this, the Club commenced to expand from two teams, to three, to four, and finally to five teams, taking over all three soccer pitches on The Simon Field.  (One of these disappeared when the present Clubhouse was built.)

During all this time, these factors were, of course, secondary to the raison d'être of the Club - the playing of amateur association football.  The choice of the Lancashire Amateur League as the vehicle for the Club's aims and ambitions proved to be the right one, most of the clubs in the League being of similar backgrounds, philosophies and aspirations. The League itself in those days was regionalised North, Central and South sections - which was necessary because most people worked on Saturday morning and travel was by public transport. Burnage playing Accrington with a 2 p.m. kick-off was just not on!! Nowadays, the Fourth Divisions remain regionalised as North and South, but the Premier, First and Second Divisions with their respective Reserve Divisions, and the Third Divisions are, of course, countywide.

From its entry into the Lancashire Amateur League in 1938 the Club required 21 years to win its first trophies.  Then in 1958-59 it hit the jackpot and gained:- 1st Division Championship; 2nd Division Championship; 2nd XI Cup Runners-Up; 3rd Division Championship (the 'A' Team); 3rd Division Runners-Up (the 'B' Team) and The Aggregate Trophy for the best Club performance in the L.A.L.

History

Burnage High SchoOl Football Club

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