Local soccer catches on in 1920
Seven teams formed the first city league, with its ‘office’ in a barber shop
Peterborough and area had played soccer competitively since the 1880s. However, I had not realized how seriously the game was pursued locally until I was tracking down other sports stories in 1920. During the 1920 season, which was organized in March and lasted until mid-November, The Examiner had excellent coverage of the soccer scene.
The editor of The Examiner since 1918 was Fred D. Craig, always known as Josh, who joined the paper in 1906 and was their top sports writer even after becoming editor.
According to the late Stan Marris, a soccer historian, the Examiner’s soccer enthusiast was Stroyan S. Leith (1889-1974) a typesetter with the paper. Leith, a native of Leith, Scotland, was married in 1916. He assisted with the 1908 efforts to build a soccer pitch in King Edward park. Clearly, he had learned the game in Scotland, one of the hotbeds of a game that was already played internationally. The Examiner during 1920 had erudite reports on what was happening in the soccer world of Scotland and England.
The combination of two enthusiasts probably accounts for the highquality reporting of soccer.
Local organized soccer had not been played “in the last few years” since the “war stripped the old teams of nearly all their players.” In March 1918, 24 people met in Coleman’s upper store, elected an interim secretary, Mr. Clarke, and heard that seven teams might be organized for a soccer season: Great War Veterans Association (Vets); CGE; Machine Gun Section (Gunners); Canadian Woolens; Caledonians (Caleys); De Laval, and Oddfellows. It was hoped that 12 teams might be found.
The Peterborough Soccer Association was established by the subsequent meeting, March 24. The meeting elected its officers. There were four honorary presidents: Mayor A.A. McIntyre; Edgar Worth; Charles Coleman; and W.R. Breyfogle. There were also four honorary vice-presidents: Alderman G.N. Gordon; Major Miller; Robert Muir; and Col. T.J. Johnston. J. Perkins (CGE) was elected president, and W. Baldwin (Canadian Woolens) vice-president. F.M. McKinley (GWVA) was secretarytreasurer and his hard-working assistant was Fred Sutcliffe whose barber shop on Charlotte was the effective office of the new league. The executive also included Alec McArthur (Caledonian); D.E. Curtis (Gunners); William Cook (DeLaval); J.W. Worth (Canadian Woolens); and E. Ray (CGE).
This meeting decided that the club fee should be $10, payable by April 15, and that each club would be limited to 18 players, all of whom must be registered by May 1. There was preliminary discussion of team colours, and of possible exhibition games with “crack Toronto teams.”
There were district soccer teams in Warsaw and Indian River and elsewhere, but the meeting chose not to invite them to join the City Soccer League as seven teams assured a full schedule of games.
The Peterborough Football Association executive met regularly at Fred Sutcliffe’s barber shop on Charlotte Street. J. Parkins was the president, while Mr. Baldwin was vice-president. Each club had a representative at the meetings which were held weekly during the season, and sometimes more often to deal with special issues.
There were several exhibition games and practices during early April. The Caledonians and CGE seemed the best organized. The Machine Gunners advertised for any soccer players not otherwise affiliated with a team. Leith commented that the Exhibition Grounds would be better if the pitches were cleared of hills and ruts, and Exhibition officials made some effort to correct that by the start of the season, April 24. In addition to reporting on the progress of the new organization, Leith made useful observations. CGE needed to do more passing. The referees needed to do closer study of the rules related to offside. DeLaval needed to recruit more players, some with considerable experience, from within their plant.
The football executive’s final arrangements for the season were in place by April 19. Fred Sutcliffe had drawn up the football schedule, approved by the Executive, to July 1; the first named team was the home team. Five referees were in place: J. Bates; F. Kieler (or J. Keller); Frank Roberts; a Mr. Lloyd; and A. Day. During the two 1920 seasons, Alex McKinley, Jack Clark, T. Hensby, W. R. Thompson, Frank McKinley and George Allen refereed, as well.
Games were to start promptly at 3 p.m. on Saturdays; and 6:30 p.m. on Thursdays. The club hoped that daylight savings time, then in discussion, would be adopted. At the time, many downtown businesses took half-day holidays on Thursday, and several plants were closed by noon on Saturday.
The opening-day games were onesided, but The Examiner was polite about the potential for all four teams. On that first day, the Caledonians won over the Vets, 6-0, while in the other game, CGE beat the Woolens 5-0. The Caledonians had a piper for the first game while the Vets had a military band.
The late afternoon of the May 22, Saturday, game at Nicholls Oval between CGE and the Gunners provides a good example of the highquality reporting. There was a fair crowd on hand. The referee was A. McKinley. Each team had a goalie, two backs or defenders, three halfbacks or mid-field players, and five forwards. CGE won the toss and the Gunners faced the sun and the light wind.
The goalies were J. Naples for CGE and Walter Flowers for the Gunners. The other ten players for CGE were B. Marsh and J. McDonald, backs; A. Parkins, W. Cowie and J. Bestard, half-backs; and forwards J. Bills, A. Cash, H. Turner, J. Williamson and Ed Hartley. On the Gunners team were D. Perry and J. Crowe, backs; M. Metcalfe, R.G. McLeish, and Harold Darling, half-backs; and J. Payne, L. Fraser, W.W. Bell, E. Bell, and Hig. Darling, forwards.
The Examiner report began. “Like a flash the CGE attacked Flowers’ goal and Gash shot past. On midfield play a [?] was given against Parkins, the CGE goal keeper made a clever stop as he punted the ball over the crossbar for a corner – it was fruitless. At the other end Williamson and Donaldson played down upon Perry who made the latter offside on attempt to play the ball. Ted Hartley came into prominence on left wing where Crowe kicked to touch….”
For the first goal, “Ted Hartley accepted a nice pass from McDonald. He tricked Metcalfe, then Crowe and running at full speed down the wing wasted no time as the ball came to a drop at his feet. The ball travelled like a shot along the ground giving W. Flowers no chance whatever. A breakaway by Hig. Darling gave the CGE defense fright; he beat two defense men and with a screen shot just missed the mark.” At half-time the score was 1-0 for CGE.
The Gunners scored two goals in the second half, and won 2-1. Hig. Darling, the left winger, “was working like a demon on a breakaway carried the ball right into the goal for the equalizer.” But the drama was with the next goal. “With ten minutes to go the CGE tried to gain the lead, but to the surprise of everybody present McLeish checked Cowie and passed forward to W. Bell who accepted the opening to go forward with the CGE backs bewildered at his play. Cool as a cucumber he beat Naples easily for the winning goal.”
In the final minutes of the game there was a fight after Williamson and Cowie collided. The referee ordered both of them out of the game with only 30 seconds remaining.
In his summary, Leith observed that Hartley’s goal in the first half “was the best scored goal of the season.” CGE had 13 goal kicks to 9 for the Gunners; nine fouls to six for the Gunners; but the Gunners won 2-1. As for the fight, Leith commented, “Crow unintentionally kicked Williamson as it is his style of play. Williamson hit Crow a punch and the Gunner retaliated with an upper cut that made CGE player groggy. Flowers [the Gunners goalie] had no right whatsoever coming out of his goal to get amongst it.”
Soccer had returned with some success.