A real home fixture for rugby league
Hotel where the sport was founded is chosen as the venue for the first National Rugby League Museum
IT IS the most obvious fit and, for many, the rightful one.
Where better to house the first-ever National Rugby League Museum than at the very spot where the sport was born 125 years ago?
The famous George Hotel, in Huddersfield, was yesterday revealed as the venue for what is hoped will be a world-class facility worthy of exhibiting rugby league’s finest memorabilia and showcasing its rich history.
The charity organisation, Rugby League Cares, announced it had forged a new partnership with Kirklees Council to help put plans in place at rugby league’s spiritual home.
Granted, there is still work to be done – Bradford City Hall was initially chosen for the project in 2016 but funding issues and numerous delays saw the project eventually re-tendered in April.
Nevertheless, there is confidence that a partnership has now been formed to deliver, and it will also act as a focal point of Kirklees Council’s multimillion pound redevelopment of Huddersfield town centre.
It was at the George Hotel where 21 clubs met on August 29, 1895, to agree a radical breakaway from the Rugby Football Union and enable working class players to be compensated for wages lost when playing rugby, thus forming the new sport. A plaque marks the occasion, inset.
The famous Grade II*-listed building has been closed since 2013. It had housed the Rugby League Heritage Centre in its basement from 2005. But it has been purchased by Kirklees Council as part of its £250m Huddersfield Blueprint, the massive regeneration plan set to change the landscape of the town centre.
Coun Shabir Pandor, leader of Kirklees Council, said: “This is absolutely fantastic news and we’re really excited to get started and bring rugby league home. We asked our residents what they wanted to see in Huddersfield town centre and one of the most popular answers was to get the George Hotel back open. We listened and made the decision to buy the building so we can make sure it not only reopens but stays open.
“It is so much more than a building to local people and to rugby league fans across the world. This is where it all began for rugby league and there is no better place to create a museum that celebrates and remembers the history of the game.”
The chairman of Rugby League Cares, Tim Adams, has vowed to make it “the envy of sports around the world in a location that means so much to so many people”.
Former Castleford star Mal Reilly, who was part of the last Great Britain side to win the Ashes against Australia in 1970, was there to witness the announcement yesterday.
Work to renovate the George Hotel is set to begin in the next few weeks, with plans for the museum’s galleries, exhibitions and interactive displays being drawn up during the coming months.
We’re really excited to get started and bring rugby league home.
Coun Shabir Pandor, the leader of Kirklees Council,
IT PROMISES to be the ultimate pub conversion – Huddersfield’s George Hotel, the spiritual home of rugby league, being transformed into the first ever national museum dedicated to a sport which has always been synonymous with the North.
The brainchild of Rugby League Cares, its new partnership with Kirklees Council to create the proposed National Rugby League Museum pays homage to a sport which was formed when 21 clubs met at the famous hotel in 1895 to agree a breakaway from the Rugby Football Union.
And with the hotel, closed since 2013, now the focal point of ambitious plans to put Huddersfield’s proud history at the heart of ambitious plans to redevelop and modernise the town centre, it is right that a permanent and prominent location is found to celebrate rugby league’s rich history. Indeed, it could be argued that the plan is already in a league of its own.