MusaAs we approach the end of 2025, the year that Everton made their momentous move from Goodison Park to Hill Dickinson Stadium, Blues superfan Dr David France is hoping that the new era will see the club embracing independent initiatives like his own.
The Widnes-born former oil and gas executive has travelled over two million miles attending Everton matches having been based in North America for the past 48 years. Christmas is a time for giving and the 77-year-old has done so much of that for the football club he loves over several decades, so to mark his achievements, the ECHO is producing a three-part special in which he reflects upon his incredible initiatives and here is the second instalment…
Originally ‘The David France Collection’, the Everton Collection is a vast compendium of football memorabilia, consisting of more than 10,000 items related to the birth and development of Everton Football Club. It took Dr France over 25 years to assemble it and despite receiving numerous offers from private investors, his dream was to make the collection available to what he called ‘The Everton Family’ and sought to transfer his world-class archives to an independent charitable trust, at a heavily discounted price.
In September 2007, the Everton Charitable Trust announced that it had secured a grant from the UK Heritage Lottery Fund to obtain the collection and it was transferred from Dr France to the Trust on December 31, 2007. This was the initiative for which Liverpool’s Freedom of the City panel rewarded Dr France with the prestigious title of Citizen of Honour in 2011 as he became the first person to receive it for services to Merseyside football since Bill Shankly.
He said: “It’s special. We contributed between 10,000 to 12,000 items and now there’s about 17,000 items in the record office.
“People don’t really know about it because we’ve only ever had two exhibitions. One was at Goodison, before my wife and I transferred the collection to public ownership – that’s something we wanted to do – and the second one was after the transfer, and we had it in the Picton Library, and that was magnificent.
“I’m hoping at some point in the future, it will be used as a means of attracting people to the new ground in one way or another. The people at Sotheby’s and Christie’s said it’s the finest collection of football memorabilia in the world, it’s the most comprehensive and the quality with the condition of the items is incredible.
“They’re near pristine condition. You’d think they were fakes, they’re that good.
“I was always interested in knowledge but I wasn’t interested in shiny things. The programmes go back to 1886 and we’ve got nearly every home programme and most of the away ones.
“They catalogue Everton’s life, but they also catalogue the history of other teams. We’ve got the oldest item of football memorabilia associated with Newton Heath (Manchester United), also Rangers and Celtic, and all the founder members of the Football League.
“We have all of the programmes from the first season of the Football League. And even better, we have all the programmes from the season before that.
“There are 50 medals, going back to the first one that was minted by the club for winning the League Championship in 1891, including a medal for everything that Everton have ever won, and a few from things that we’ve come runners-up for. There are also the minute books which are incredible.
“They document every decision made by the club from 1886 to 1965. They met twice a week and picked the colours, picked the name of Goodison Park and they picked the teams, because for a long period, these were the years before they had a manager.
“They include scouting reports, transfer negotiations, the building of the ground and modifications, it’s all in there. These items are priceless.
“In the end, it became an obstacle in transferring the collection because I think certain people at the club were a bit embarrassed that they’d discarded them, and they didn’t want to buy them back. But we transferred them for a fraction of their value through Lord Grantchester, who is in charge of the collection.
“There are also all the season tickets from all the days of Stanley Park, through Priory Road, Anfield and then Goodison. These were the days when you’d just go around the touchline with a bucket to collect the money.
“There are single match tickets and one of the sad things now that we move to an era of mobile phones is that you no longer have the ticket stub and you no longer have that memento of going to the match. You could root through your collection, and these items could help you to remember going to these games.
“We’ve got correspondence from the club going back to 1886, the first team photograph from when we’d first changed our name from St Domingo. We’ve got every cigarette card, every post card and publications going back to 1894, so it would be great at some point if we could add value to the stadium by having a heritage centre and you could walk into it.
“I call it ‘Toffee World.’ You go in, and like I was, you’re indoctrinated – so much so that by the time you come out of the other end at the souvenir shop, you can’t walk for all the things you’ve bought.”
The EFC Heritage Society was formed by Dr David France OBE in 2008 and consists of Evertonian authors, researchers, memorabilia collectors and statisticians. Dr France said: “When we get new signings, they mention two things: the history of the club, how they’re proud to be associated with a club possessing such a rich history; and such a loyal and intimidating fanbase. All clubs are special, but I think that’s what makes Everton extra special.
“We needed an organisation that would verify facts about the club. Sometimes, I think we’re guilty of exaggerating our contributions to football, so we need to provide reliable information.
“The Heritage Society was organised for that reason, but also to educate people, and I think that’s even more important. We educate people by publications, by lectures, by writing books – members of the heritage society have authored over 100 books.
“I must mention Paul Wharton, Brendan Connolly, Ken Rogers and Peter Lupson who have steered the Heritage Society in my absence. I start things up and then I disappear, so I would really like to congratulate them.”
Musa