the Arsenal Stadium mysteries
Thorold Dickinson's 1939 comedy-thriller puts all its efforts at authenticity into the football stadium, the footballers shown playing there and the crowd shown watching them:
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For a cine-tourist, the documentary interest of the film relates chiefly to the stadium's pitch and stands. Scenes set in the dressing rooms and offices appear to be studio-constructed, though the marble hall with Epstein's bust of Herbert Chapman looks like the real thing:
Beyond Highbury Stadium, very little of the real city is shown. A taxi-ride from central London to Highbury includes back-projected views of unidentifiable streets:
Otherwise the film's street scenes are all studio confections:
'entrance to Highbury Stadium'
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'Welford Mews, Baker Street, W.1'
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As a Chelsea supporter I am disinterested, but as a North Londoner I would have been very interested in what the film showed of the Highbury area beyond the precincts of the ground. Unfortunately, that is very little. The film is stadium-centric, allowing glimpses of the vicinity only insofar as the roofs of houses on Gillespie Road, Avenell Road and Highbury Hill appear in views of the stadium:
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The heading of this post refers to 'mysteries'. The mystery that interests me more directly relates to a family legend, propagated by my grandmother, according to which she was born on the Arsenal's football pitch. The less fanciful version of her story was that the house in which she was born was demolished to make way for the stadium.
Alice Ellen Lack, née Hill, was born on January 8th 1912, and registered at Islington. The Woolwich Arsenal football team moved from South-East to North London just after that, playing their first match at the new stadium on September 6th 1913.
The dates fit, but the maps don't. This 1898 map of the area shows the land that would be leased to build the ground - the playing fields of St John's College of Divinity:
This 1915 map shows the area after the stadium was built:
None of the houses in the immediate vicinity of the playing fields has been demolished to accommodate the Arsenal. It looks like even the plainer version of my grandmother's story was fanciful.
Her family's home at the time of her birth was, I think, on Elphinstone Street, no. 2, at the junction with Avenell Road. This was very near the ground, and the house has since been demolished, so it easy to see how the story may have come about.
I was certainly impressed by it as a child, though not so much that I would be loyal to my grandmother's roots. Choosing to support a West London club in 1969 was for me a declaration of independence from the North London norm.
There are Arsenal supporters among my grandmother's fifty or so direct descendants, but they have to compete with Spurs and West Ham fans, and even, among the diaspora, with some supporters of Manchester United.
Her family's home at the time of her birth was, I think, on Elphinstone Street, no. 2, at the junction with Avenell Road. This was very near the ground, and the house has since been demolished, so it easy to see how the story may have come about.
I was certainly impressed by it as a child, though not so much that I would be loyal to my grandmother's roots. Choosing to support a West London club in 1969 was for me a declaration of independence from the North London norm.
There are Arsenal supporters among my grandmother's fifty or so direct descendants, but they have to compete with Spurs and West Ham fans, and even, among the diaspora, with some supporters of Manchester United.
For more on the film and its director, see this review of the film by my UCL colleague (and Arsenal supporter) Philip Horne.
(My thanks to Auntie Christine for the places and dates.)
(My thanks to Auntie Christine for the places and dates.)
