iris123 Posted January 18, 2007 Report Share Posted January 18, 2007 (edited) Just looking up somethings and came across this Now i didn't think Johnnie Hoskins was involved in West Ham until a few years later.Nor i thought did he have the sort of money to build a 100,000 capacity stadium.Can't be right surely? It was just by luck,looking for some details of the legendary Thames FC.I remember reading before that they played in a massive stadium.Didn't realise it was the speedway stadium A good ariel photo of the stadium.Although i see the bloody link doesn't work Edited January 18, 2007 by iris123 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
speedyguy Posted January 18, 2007 Report Share Posted January 18, 2007 Just looking up somethings and came across this Now i didn't think Johnnie Hoskins was involved in West Ham until a few years later.Nor i thought did he have the sort of money to build a 100,000 capacity stadium.Can't be right surely? It was just by luck,looking for some details of the legendary Thames FC.I remember reading before that they played in a massive stadium.Didn't realise it was the speedway stadium A good ariel photo of the stadium.Although i see the bloody link doesn't work <{POST_SNAPBACK}> From what I remember, West Ham (Custom House) was finished in 1928. Thames FC were the first tenants bu speedway under Jimmy Baxter started in July 1928, as I believe greyhounds did. Johnnie Hoskins turned up some time later. Over to Norbold! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ron Butler Posted January 18, 2007 Report Share Posted January 18, 2007 Probably built by George Wimpey as was everything else in that era. Incidentally, there was not an individual named George Wimpey. One explanation of the company name is that it meant We Import More Paddies Every Year, George was added for the obvious reason. Later the company was acquired by the Prudential Assurance Company whose chairman officially stated that Wimpey meant We Issue More Policies Every Year. Apparently you pays you premium and you takes your choice! Ron. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
speedyguy Posted January 18, 2007 Report Share Posted January 18, 2007 I understand that the actual stadium was designed by Archibald Leitch, but have no idea who the builders were. As stated, it could have been George Wimpey company. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
iris123 Posted January 18, 2007 Author Report Share Posted January 18, 2007 (edited) The famous Archibald Leitch.The man who designed quite a few superb football stadiums and Ibrox. And of course i wasn't looking for the company that built the stadium.But wondering who financed the building of it,in answer to the statement on the link.When they say it was "built by Johnnie Hoskins"i didn't believe that they meant he was out with his shovel and trowel building the place Edited January 18, 2007 by iris123 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
speedyguy Posted January 18, 2007 Report Share Posted January 18, 2007 The famous Archibald Leitch.The man who designed quite a few superb football stadiums and Ibrox. And of course i wasn't looking for the company that built the stadium.But wondering who financed the building of it,in answer to the statement on the link.When they say it was "built by Johnnie Hoskins"i didn't believe that they meant he was out with his shovel and trowel building the place <{POST_SNAPBACK}> To be honest, I don't think Johnnie Hoskins had anything at all to do with the building or early promoting at West Ham. This was, I am positive, Jimmy Baxter who also devised the idea for league racing. In teh 1930s he promoted at speedway and midget cars at several tracks. In 1947 he brought Southampton back into the sport and, I think, also promoted at Plymouth. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Custom House Kid Posted January 18, 2007 Report Share Posted January 18, 2007 My views on this subject are on my website In 1928 Jim Baxter in conjunction with the Greyhound Racing Association set about constructing a Stadium at Custom House in the East End of London. Initially the construction ran behind schedule and Jim opened up operations at White City ( Glasgow) to accommodate the interest shown in the sport! Johnnie Hoskins writes in his History of the Hammers ' I well remember visiting West Ham in 1928, when Sprouts Elder, Paddy Dean and Manager Jimmy Baxter were busy laying the track, which was opened on the Saturday, July 28nd, at 2.45 p.m.’ It should be noted that the first Greyhound meeting took place on the 4th of August 1928. I also have pages under construction but have made pictures available here I am still looking for further detail on the subject! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
star ghost Posted January 19, 2007 Report Share Posted January 19, 2007 (edited) I suspect this can be added to all the other claims made about Johnnie Hoskins Archibald Leitch designed the Grandstands at various football grounds. I think he did the one at the Wellesley Ground, Great Yarmouth. It is reputed to be the oldest stand now in existence. In the early post-war days an aerial photo of Custom House adorned the front cover of the programme. Edited January 19, 2007 by star ghost Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
iris123 Posted January 19, 2007 Author Report Share Posted January 19, 2007 It looks like they have taken the info from the Newham site and an answer from Vic Dawe to the question about the stadium.Seems to be a bit of false info on the net,as yesterday on a Stock car site i saw they had the wrong piece of land listed as the site of the old New Cross stadium. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
norbold Posted January 19, 2007 Report Share Posted January 19, 2007 I've removed the reference to Johnnie Hoskins on the Wikipedia site. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
iris123 Posted January 19, 2007 Author Report Share Posted January 19, 2007 I've removed the reference to Johnnie Hoskins on the Wikipedia site. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> You have that power? I was looking for a link to say the info was wrong,but couldn't see anything.Other than to reply on the Newham site.Nice one Norbold Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
norbold Posted January 19, 2007 Report Share Posted January 19, 2007 You have that power? Anyone can. That's the point of Wikipedia. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
iris123 Posted January 19, 2007 Author Report Share Posted January 19, 2007 Oh yeah,i know the point of wikepedia.Just didn't know you could change stuff without a cerstificate Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
arnieg Posted January 19, 2007 Report Share Posted January 19, 2007 Oh yeah,i know the point of wikepedia.Just didn't know you could change stuff without a cerstificate <{POST_SNAPBACK}> All you need to do is register - then you can edit. I amended a reference to Ove Fundin's 1976 World championship win! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
iris123 Posted January 19, 2007 Author Report Share Posted January 19, 2007 All you need to do is register - then you can edit. I amended a reference to Ove Fundin's 1976 World championship win! <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Fair enough.But it leaves itself open for someone like Vic Dawe to come along later and put in a reference to Mr Hoskins again or Isambard Kingdom Brunel Just imagined for something like that it would have to be checked before posted. Anyone know much anything about Jimmy Baxter? And the history of the GRA?How did they become so powerful,opening up massive stadiums like this.I mean it must have been only rivalled by Wembley at the time.In the south at least Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Parsloes 1928 nearly Posted January 19, 2007 Report Share Posted January 19, 2007 How did they become so powerful,opening up massive stadiums like this.I mean it must have been only rivalled by Wembley at the time.In the south at least <{POST_SNAPBACK}> I don't think you have to be powerful to open a huge stadium. Just optimistic...!!!!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
iris123 Posted January 19, 2007 Author Report Share Posted January 19, 2007 I don't think you have to be powerful to open a huge stadium. Just optimistic...!!!!! <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Well they must have been bloody optimistic.Reading a bit on the net the automated hare thing came to Britain from the US in 1926.In 1927 40 odd stadiums were built.Maybe or probably(i don't know)not all by the GRA.I would imagine as well that at the time the building of Custom House was started speedway was virtually unknown.Certainly couldn't have known how big a success it would be.Maybe that is why a football club was formed as well.Trying to get as many uses out of the stadium as possible.I would guess speedway wasn't in the initial plans for the stadium Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Parsloes 1928 nearly Posted January 22, 2007 Report Share Posted January 22, 2007 (edited) The motivation behind building such a huge stadium at Custom House in the mid-20s is, I’d agree, something of a mystery. As the arena was ready for its first events in the summer of 1928 and having been such a huge building project, it is clear indeed - as iris says - that Speedway (which only debuted in the south of England that February) can’t surely have been foremost (or even there at all..) in the stadium builders’ minds when they planned the place. Dog racing must have been, I guess (I suppose in those days for whatever reason they were able to build quicker than we seem able to today..?!). Which leaves Football. I had, I’d admit, been labouring under the misapprehension that the football club came along some while later; but actually the club formed to play there, Thames Association played their first match within a month or so of the first dog and Speedway meetings.. Brian Belton mentions in his book, ‘When West Ham went to the Dogs’ that the stadium was built on the site of the Custom House Football Ground (sorry for raising your blood pressure here norbold: there are just two things that strike fear into our norb...: mention of the esteemed ‘Dr.’ (sic) and me uttering those four words, “Do you want a lift?”!!)… If the owners thought the football club could be a success they were sadly (dramatically so) mistaken.. iris refers to the club as the “legendary Thames FC”..: well maybe, but a football club legendary only for being without question the least successful and by far-and-away the shortest-lived of any senior club in history. Incredible isn’t it to relate that the club was actually only in existence from 1928 to 1932; and yet – having started in the Southern League – spent a couple of seasons in the Football League! The thing proven by their failure (how about a all-time lowest ever FL crowd of 469 punters for one match..: in a ground with a capacity then of 120,000!!!: that’s just 0.39% full..!!) was that (1) the 1920s was simply far too late to try and form a big club in London: the likes of West Ham United, Arsenal , Tottenham, Orient had – like most football clubs – been formed some thirty to forty years earlier and were therefore well-established; and (2) that though having a large ground undoubtedly gave the club a rapidly accelerated route into the FL , it only served to exacerbate, with the consequence of insolvency, the lack of support/demand for the club. Seems ironic to me that Thames had its spell in the sun whereas hugely successful and long-enduring non-league sides in the area remained massive clubs for years without a sniff of FL entrance: clubs like Ilford, Leytonstone, Romford, Barking and Walthamstow Avenue.. As Mr. Belton, writing of the Custom House bowl’s enduring enormity puts it, “it was a monument to the symbiosis between environment and architecture”…: phew!!! So, I wonder what were the (main) thoughts behind the construction of the ‘Wembley of the East End’..??!! Edited January 22, 2007 by Parsloes 1928 nearly Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
norbold Posted January 22, 2007 Report Share Posted January 22, 2007 Obviously we need Dr Belton to clear all this up for us... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
iris123 Posted January 22, 2007 Author Report Share Posted January 22, 2007 .. iris refers to the club as the “legendary Thames FC”..: well maybe, but a football club legendary only for being without question the least successful and by far-and-away the shortest-lived of any senior club in history. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> That was why i said legendary Parsloes.Also the fact that hardly anyone has ever heard of the London side who played in one of the biggest stadium in the country.Plus you left out the Lions in your list of clubs there Most definitely in the same catchment area Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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