That’s clearly from the mid 80s but, strangely, I don’t remember that building next to the Rookery at all. Perhaps it looks different from that angle. Was it a police control room, or something else? And was it there long?
Not sure what the official use for upstairs was - but downstairs it was the ticket office. Have a vivid memory of a surreal moment that took place in that building when I went with my dad to collect the tickets for a game and Glenn Roeder was in there, talking to the girl behind the counter. As the tickets were being printed, my dad proceeded to chat to Glenn like he'd known him for years! I mooched in the corner, embarrassed! If you can stand to listen to Bassett, he's in that building during this interview:
That building appeared in 1985 and was there until the Rookery redevelopment in 1994. I remember reading somewhere it was the Police control room though oddly it didn't seem to have windows overlooking the Rookery stand itself. *Correction- in the vid Jossy posted it does look like the windows went partly around the Rookery stand side.
You are correct Otter. Found this is a programme from the time.. Begs the question of where the police control room was. I recall there was an open police observation areas under the scoreboard but that cant have been it surely?
Hope i dont get anyone in hot water for this (me for instance!) but this is one of the images that appears in the new Watford Treasury publication and i think it's worth the cover price all on it's own. As the captions says we've just knocked Liverpool out of the cup and young skinheads are on the pitch! and what about that Graffiti.. top class!
Nah, before my time. I was around 10 years later mind.. or at least a Rude Boy with a no.2. Have you ever seen a pic with the Rookery graffiti before?
I haven't, no. And I've never noticed it in the footage of that game on YouTube. Might have to go back and watch loads of the old stuff and see if I can spot any more. When I'm really bored!
I knew about it.. but cant recall if i'd seen pics or footage of it. Maybe just bits of it. Possibly even traces of it left into the early 80's? Brilliant that they cleared that part of the terrace for this pic.. and we get to see it in it's full gory. Also just shows you the times as they were ie not cleaned up by the club.
I remember the graffiti being at the back of the Rookery when I first started going in 1970 (I used to stand on the terrace in front of the Shrodelles stand). More importantly can I reiterate how wonderful the first issue of the Watford Treasury is? I bought it before the game yesterday and have read it cover to cover. I urge all fans to get hold of a copy. A couple of highlights were the article about the time Watford previously wore stripes - I remembered being at the friendly when it happened, but not when it was or who against - and the amazing model of a mid-70s Vicarage Road.
What with GT being in the news over the past few days, I stumbled across a high-res version of this well known pic without any water mark. Managed to remove some dust and scratches that had no doubt accumulated on the original over the years and also made a few tweaks to the tone and contrast:
You can order it here, Carpster: https://thewatfordtreasury.co.uk/ And it'll be on sale at the Vic for the Brighton game.
I think this one is better.. cause it shows the Rookery roof and famous WO clock. Wasn't this GT's first day at the club?
Pretty sure it was - I think there's an article from a programme on oldwatford.com where it's featured, and the double page spread has been scanned, albeit with the picture disappearing into the spine. Might even have posted it in this thread, but I'm too lazy to go back and check! I'm sure you won't be surprised to know that I have a high res version of your preferred picture also:
Regarding recent history - there's a good article on the official site today about our opening day unbeaten run. Includes some great pics: https://www.watfordfc.com/teams/first-team/gallery-dozen-unbeaten-opening-days Here's a couple of examples:
Yes. The tv commentator made the comment early in the game that the familiar worry for Watford that season was "where the goals were going to come from". Enter Graham & Sordell. Hopefully TD & AG will be as successful.
I thought mine was more hi res tbh Found another from the same day.. You've no doubt seen the other lawnmower shot but note the hut in the background here.. could that be the infamous Marie Celeste tea bar?
A selection of the cracking photos that have turned up online recently.. some from the Hornet History Facebook group and some from this WO Instagram page.. https://www.instagram.com/watfordobserver/
The Watford Treasury are posting some of their great pics via their twitter account now: https://twitter.com/treasurywatford If you isolate the image url's and add :large after .jpeg, you can access bigger versions of them (for some, not all).
Interesting to see, in the Cliff Horton penalty pic (about 1960?), the old Rookery without the Watford Observer clock. Anyone know when the clock was installed?
Yes spot on. April 1960, 5-1 win over Gateshead (Holton hatrick) So a year or so after construction of the Rookery terrace. Ive no idea when the clock showed up but i shall endeavour to find out.
A friend of mine (Palace fan but nice guy nonetheless) has just found out that Watford used to play in blue and asked me why they changed. The Official Watford FC history book rather glosses over it and says the Board just changed the colours to gold and black but doesn’t give a reason. Does anyone have any more info on this, perhaps from a relative who was around in 1959? I do know the story that the club asked for suggestions for a new nickname and two people independently suggested The Hornets, so they went with that.
The official site has recently improved its history section, and now has separate pages on each era, broken up like so: 1881-1939: The Formative Years 1939-1959: Post-War Struggles 1959-1969: Moving On Up 1969-1977: Back To Square One 1977-1987: Golden Days 1987-1996: Sliding Backwards 1996-2001: Back On The Map 2001-2012: Crises And Surprises 2012 to present: The Pozzo Era Worth a look: https://www.watfordfc.com/club/history Includes some good pictures, such as - + a few more.
The change was initiated because of the need to save money. A director suggested we went for a less common colour to save money on not having an away kit (believe it or not) and then another director.. and whisper this.. suggested we went for gold shirts "to resemble Wolves"cause they were the team of the moment. This is stated in the centenary book so i guess it's accurate. Cliff Holton was also supposed to have had a say in it but i'm not sure how. I think the nickname was chosen from suggestions made in a competition run by the supporters club.
The need for an away kit would have been because of the predominance of teams playing in blue and white in Div. 4 in 59-60 (the first season in old gold & black). There were 13 out of the 24 clubs having blue as their main colour - we would have been the 14th! Incidentally one of those teams with blue in their strip was Palace, who beat us 8-1 at Selhurst Park on a midweek evening in September - only for us to beat them 6 days later 4-2 at Vicarage Road.