Grew up in St Paul’s Cray. The only kids who didn’t support Charlton were the ones who knew nothing about football..The mate I sat next to on my first day at lessons hill school in 1959 sits next to me in the East Stand to this day. Proud to support Charlton, that pride does not exist elsewhere. ( IMO )
Born in Charlton. Lived in Charlton for over 25 years. Parents and grandparents supported Charlton. Grandparents used to provide lodgings for some Charlton players. Would have been beaten with a large stick by my father if I had supported any other team.
Born in Woolwich, lived in Westcombe Hill. Dad was Millwall, my brother was born on the day Charlton won the FA Cup. Dad wanted a better upbringing for me than he had had, so he told my brother to take me to The Valley when I was 5 in 1959. Took each of my three sons to The Valley when they could say 'oi ref you're crap', and the rest, as they say, is history.
Dad worked at Elliotts in Deptford & it was either them or us. Took me & my brothers when we were 7 or 8 & never looked back. I've been taking my 3 since they were around 4 or 5 but only the eldest has caught the bug. I think the other 2 have had a lucky escape but Golfie Jnr will love me for evermore.
Also born in the hospital for mothers and babies. Dad, grandad and big bro supported Charlton. Was taken at the age of four to my first game which was the last game at the valley, took some of the turf home.
I have been going every season since and this is my 33rd season.
Now live in Yorkshire for work but travel down for every Saturday home game, will never give up my season ticket.
Absolutely love this club. Given me so many fond memories.
We did this a few months ago in another thread but it’s always interesting to hear peoples’ stories This is what I posted in that thread (give or take a few words).
An interesting question. I was born and raised in a small town in the west of Scotland. My father bless him was a good amateur footballer but had no time for the Rangers v Celtic pantomime that dominated the local area so as a nipper he took me to watch Kilmarnock. A bit like Leicester, they had somehow managed to win the league in 1964-65, the year of my birth. But that was very much the highlight. It was downhill from there Essentially the local standing joke was that you went to watch Killie cos you couldn't get into Ibrox.
Whatever the case, I was brought up on a diet of well intentioned second best, watched by a small band of supporters who genuinely cared about their local team regardless of the large scale tribalism that surrounded us. The football wasn't often great but I still have vivid memories of my heros. Eddie Morrison, Davie Provan, Gordon Smith, Jim Stewart, Georgie Maxwell (scorer of the sweetest 25 yard volley I've ever seen), some of whom went on to bigger and better things. Rugby Park was a dump, but it was home.
The other element of local history that is relevant, is that in those days, because of our location in the hills on the west coast, we could pick up Ulster Television, so I was able to watch The Big Match with Brian Moore on a Sunday. In those days, the staple diet for the main game was either West Ham or Fulham (in the Best and Moore era). But Charlton featured occasionally. So I developed a soft spot for London teams.
After university I moved to London in 86. In search of a team to support I spent the mornings reading the paper to find out which game I fancied and then popped along to pay my fiver to stand on the terraces at whatever game took my fancy. Innocent days indeed! I never really developed an attachment to any team in particular but by this point Charlton had been chucked out of the Valley and I sympathetically recalled those images on Ulster TV of Alan Simonsson and Derek Hales. My "big break" came in 88 when I moved to Dartford and my next door neighbour was an Addick fanatic (he still sits near me in the West Upper). He took me to my first game against Bolton in 92 I think it was. We had to walk across the foundations of the east stand to get to the Jimmy seed where we sat. Charlton won 3-0 despite being played offf the park with fatty Garland scoring a 30 yard screamer at the coveted end. (Coveted is a typo but it kinda works!)
I'd love to say I was hooked, but actually it was a slow burner. I went to a few games over the next year or two but came slowly to realise that this was the football I wanted to watch. Not the big corporate faceless premier league stuff (things were heading that way by this stage), and I began to feel very similarly to how I had done about Killie all those years before.
I finally took the plunge when I was trying to do to my own young sons what my father had done to me. Sadly, their attraction was but a fleeting dalliance, but I've been going ever since. Why Charlton? Well it just feels "normal". Proper football played by players I can identify with and the comfort of home that is the Valley. And for the majority of my time, it has felt like a family business. Maybe not always very professionally run, but always with feeling and with the right values.
I got the tail end of the premiership years. We struggled, but always took pride in the fact that we were the model family club. Even after we got relegated and splashed the cash on Dowie and Pardew, we did it with a kind of well meaning innocence. 11-12 was just heaven. A group of players that I'd recognise in the street and a manager who, whilst not perfect, really got what Charlton meant and was one of us.
By the time the current regime took over I was falling out of love with football bigstyle. The money, the influx of overseas prima donnas, the influence of the premier league etc. Roland's plans to grow his own and to hell with the agents all seemed like the next natural chapter in the story of my club. It took about six months before I realised he was bonkers and for his odious sidekick to piss me off. Things feel as though we might be turning a corner again. I’ve enjoyed this season and the day can’t be far off when the curse is removed.
That's "my Charlton" folks. Sorry to be so indulgent
Also born in the hospital for mothers and babies. Dad, grandad and big bro supported Charlton. Was taken at the age of four to my first game which was the last game at the valley, took some of the turf home.
I have been going every season since and this is my 33rd season.
Now live in Yorkshire for work but travel down for every Saturday home game, will never give up my season ticket.
Absolutely love this club. Given me so many fond memories.
Don’t start using charlton as the reason you come down every Saturday home game. The only reason you come down is so you can get your end away down The Millers.
I'm from Chelmsford with no league team, so everyone supports ransoms. I dabbled with arsenal (got the subbutteo team), Sheffield Wednesday (got the scarf), but wanted to see games other than Chelmsford city. Went to Ipswich a couple of times, and Charlton (dad used to be mates with a Charlton fan, and saw them a fair bit when he was younger), and got hooked on the addicks.
Grew up in St Paul’s Cray. The only kids who didn’t support Charlton were the ones who knew nothing about football..The mate I sat next to on my first day at lessons hill school in 1959 sits next to me in the East Stand to this day. Proud to support Charlton, that pride does not exist elsewhere. ( IMO )
Went to primary school there and was the only Charlton so good ton know we had a fan base there
We did this a few months ago in another thread but it’s always interesting to hear peoples’ stories This is what I posted in that thread (give it take a few words).
An interesting question. I was born and raised in a small town in the west of Scotland. My father bless him was a good amateur footballer but had no time for the Rangers v Celtic pantomime that dominated the local area so as a nipper he took me to watch Kilmarnock. A bit like Leicester, they had somehow managed to win the league in 1964-65, the year of my birth. But that was very much the highlight. It was downhill from there Essentially the local standing joke was that you went to watch Killie cos you couldn't get into Ibrox.
Whatever the case, I was brought up on a diet of well intentioned second best, watched by a small band of supporters who genuinely cared about their local team regardless of the large scale tribalism that surrounded us. The football wasn't often great but I still have vivid memories of my heros. Eddie Morrison, Davie Provan, Gordon Smith, Jim Stewart, Georgie Maxwell (scorer of the sweetest 25 yard volley I've ever seen), some of whom went on to bigger and better things. Rugby Park was a dump, but it was home.
The other element of local history that is relevant, is that in those days, because of our location in the hills on the west coast, we could pick up Ulster Television, so I was able to watch The Big Match with Brian Moore on a Sunday. In those days, the staple diet for the main game was either West Ham or Fulham (in the Best and Moore era). But Charlton featured occasionally. So I developed a soft spot for London teams.
After university I moved to London in 86. In search of a team to support I spent the mornings reading the paper to find out which game I fancied and then popped along to pay my fiver to stand on the terraces at whatever game took my fancy. Innocent days indeed! I never really developed an attachment to any team in particular but by this point Charlton had been chucked out of the Valley and I sympathetically recalled those images on Ulster TV of Alan Simonsson and Derek Hales. My "big break" came in 88 when I moved to Dartford and my next door neighbour was an Addick fanatic (he still sits near me in the West Upper). He took me to my first game against Bolton in 92 I think it was. We had to walk across the foundations of the east stand to get to the Jimmy seed where we sat. Charlton won 3-0 despite being played offf the park with fatty Garland scoring a 30 yard screamer at the coveted end. (Coveted is a typo but it kinda works!)
I'd love to say I was hooked, but actually it was a slow burner. I went to a few games over the next year or two but came slowly to realise that this was the football I wanted to watch. Not the big corporate faceless premier league stuff (things were heading that way by this stage), and I began to feel very similarly to how I had done about Killie all those years before.
I finally took the plunge when I was trying to do to my own young sons what my father had done to me. Sadly, their attraction was but a fleeting dalliance, but I've been going ever since. Why Charlton? Well it just feels "normal". Proper football played by players I can identify with and the comfort of home that is the Valley. And for the majority of my time, it has felt like a family business. Maybe not always very professionally run, but always with feeling and with the right values.
I got the tail end of the premiership years. We struggled, but always took pride in the fact that we were the model family club. Even after we got relegated and splashed the cash on Dowie and Pardew, we did it with a kind of well meaning innocence. 11-12 was just heaven. A group of players that I'd recognise in the street and a manager who, whilst not perfect, really got what Charlton meant and was one of us.
By the time the current regime took over I was falling out of love with football bigstyle. The money, the influx of overseas prima donnas, the influence of the premier league etc. Roland's plans to grow his own and to hell with the agents all seemed like the next natural chapter in the story of my club. It took about six months before I realised he was bonkers and for his odious sidekick to piss me off. Things feel as though we might be turning a corner again. I’ve enjoyed this season and the day can’t be far off when the curse is removed.
That's "my Charlton" folks. Sorry to be so indulgent
Love the details and background to these type of threads so indulge away!
Born in Woolwich but moved around a bit. Wasn't into football as a kid and didn't know what team my dad supported. Was given an Arsenal bag one birthday but thought that's not me. Got to about 12/13 and was fascinated by the turmoil at Charlton, kicked out of the Valley but battling for promotion. Love an underdog and i' d found my home. Rode up on my bike to a deserted Valley and snuck in to soak up the atmosphere of a desolate terrace and head high weeds. Sad but serene. Later found out Charlton were my dad's team and he was one of the lost fans from the seventies. Must be in the blood.
My dad. I have to remind myself of this when I'm being judgemental of supporters of big teams. If my dad had been a Man Utd fan, I probably would be too. Scary.
I remember my grandad took me back in 95/96 season when I was 9 to watch us in the FA Cup against the Massive. Sure we won 2-0. Was hooked ever since. It was a Saturday thing we done together from then on. Bit of a family tradition now supporting Charlton. Trying to get my now 9 year old to support them isn’t go so well though!
I'd always had a soft spot for them in the Premier League years because they were known as the "well run small club done good." And then I became good mates with a Charlton lass at university, and when I went over to study abroad she took me to my first match, we beat Palace 2-0 and I'd been to two other matches that week (Capello's first game managing England at Wembley and getting to watch Kieran Gibbs and Darren Huckerby for Norwich), and Charlton was far and away the best footballing experience. It's everything I'd pictured a football ground to be, just sort of set in the neighborhood off the high street. And yeah, my mate's family kind of took me in as one of their own and I've been Charlton for a decade this week.
Born in Woolwich (Military Hospital Woolwich Common). I lost my dad when I was seven and my elder brother started taking me (64/65 season) - so my first taste was watching the likes of Mike Bailey, Eddie, Len, Keeffy, Bonzo, Hewie and so on. Then didn't go to many until late 60s when a new next door neighbour and his son asked me if I wanted to go. Watching the likes of Harry Gregory, Matt Tees, Keefy still of course, Ray Treacy, Charlie Wright, Bobby Curtis, Alan Campbell, Paul Went, and so on cemented my love affair and have been a fully paid up Addick ever since.
My sons didn't have a choice, even though by the time they were born we lived in Kent. I kept our season tickets even after we moved up t'north 10 years ago but haven't been to many games in the last few seasons.
My dad (RIP, died on Wednesday) was a big Arsenal fan. He had started to take me to Highbury as a nipper for the odd game but was notorious for running late for everything, including football. One Saturday, we were on our way to Arsenal from Abbey Wood and we were running later than ever. Once on the train, the old man moaned that we would be lucky to make Highbury by half time and said it just at the point the train slowed for a station. There is a ground I said, pointing at the Valley and there are people inside, why don't we go there instead? He gave this some thought then at the point the the train started to leave Charlton station, we baled out.
And that was that, I was hooked from that day. Looking back, I think it was the Valley itself that lured me. Yes, Highbury was all very grand and the perfect football stadium back then but those towering terraces just had something about them.
I didn't know any other team existed, not even England. Both sides of my family are from endless generations of Charlton Athletic fans. I fell in love as soon as I walked down Floyd Road with my dad for the first time at five years old, 5th December 1992.
I have tears in my eyes even writing that. I love my club. It's so much more than football.
My dad (RIP, died on Wednesday) was a big Arsenal fan. He had started to take me to Highbury as a nipper for the odd game but was notorious for running late for everything, including football. One Saturday, we were on our way to Arsenal from Abbey Wood and we were running later than ever. Once on the train, the old man moaned that we would be lucky to make Highbury by half time and said it just at the point the train slowed for a station. There is a ground I said, pointing at the Valley and there are people inside, why don't we go there instead? He gave this some thought then at the point the the train started to leave Charlton station, we baled out.
And that was that, I was hooked from that day. Looking back, I think it was the Valley itself that lured me. Yes, Highbury was all very grand and the perfect football stadium back then but those towering terraces just had something about them.
Born in North Cray. Man U supporting brother took me to my first CAFC game at the Valley, then CAFC supporting brother would bring me to stand with him on the vast but empty East Terrace, as a teenager I would alternate one week at Charlton the other at West Ham, it's when we moved to Selhurst I really became a proper fan. Started taking my son when he was 6, now almost 22, asked me about two years ago with all the crap flying around, why I lumbered him with being a Charlton fan, he is obsessed with the club now, not even this hopeless regime will dilute that.
My Dad and Granddad lived round the corner both worked there I tagged along with my brother when we were nippers we both ended up working there as well, now my son has started working a couple of games Charlton thru and thru
Too much of a wuss for Millwall, I dont have a caravan or drag my knuckles on the floor so Gillinghams out, Im not called Nigel and I dont like stripes so Palace gone (and QPR), West Ham, Fulham and Orient are over, or close to, the river and Im scared of water.
Too cheap for Arsenal, not a cabby so Spurs out, not a complete money obsessed glory hunting twat so Chelsea eliminated and where the hell IS Brentford anyway?, so there was really no other choice.
I was also identified as having masochistic tendancies as a child, I liked playing with my train set, preferred Haddock to Cod, wasn't allergic to peanuts, liked wide open spaces, oh and my Dad TOLD ME I was Charlton, put your Coat on were going!
OH and I've just remembered, I'm a lardarse, and they used to do really good hot dogs nearing the ground from the park, and the smell of onions wafted towards you as you approached, and there was a great view of London from the top of the East Terrace, the players looked tiny on the immaculate pitch, Killer could be counted on to score and lamp an opponant, you could guarantee the programme would be shit, and you could switch ends if you fancied it, and there was always the hope that the referee was Mr Kirkpatrick running backwards with his short legs and his bald head reflecting off the floodlights, and I always loved when you entered the ground from the covered end you walked up the steps and suddenly saw the expanse of green turf.
You know, sod the boycott, Im going today!, Up the Addicks.
My Dad grew up in Eltham and supported CAFC since the early years in the league in the 20s, so he took me in the mid 50s. I was brought up thinking our natural place was in the top flight and watching players I still think of as club legends - Bartram, Hewie, Leary, Firmani etc. Then we got relegated and I cried for the first time.... Next year we only needed to draw the last game at home to the 3rd team, Blackburn, but we lost so I cried for the second time...... I started to realise that supporting your local team was no picnic.
30 years rolled by in more or less constant obscurity until we reached the top flight again in the late 80s but by this time we had become homeless. Now another 30 years have come and gone. In that time we've had some really great times and more recently some record bad years.
Supporting Charlton has necessarily but too often been about events off the pitch, or even whether we have have a pitch to play on at all. But I wouldn't want to support the Woolwich rejects - arguing with each other, angsting, and ringing the call-in programmes year after year about whether they are going to finish in the top 4 or not. How dull would that be.
Sharing rental place with my mate Sean at Beulah hill 1987, the place was so cold and draughty, we decided to go to Sulherst park, watched the Nigels, hated everything about them. Then on saturday went again to see this other team that was lodging there. They couldn't score to save their lives, just like me... so Bolder Read Humphrey, Shirtlift Walsh McKenzie, Mortimer Jones, Croocks Lee Leeeeeaaaabbbuuurrrnnnn !!!!!
Comments
I have been going every season since and this is my 33rd season.
Now live in Yorkshire for work but travel down for every Saturday home game, will never give up my season ticket.
Absolutely love this club. Given me so many fond memories.
An interesting question. I was born and raised in a small town in the west of Scotland. My father bless him was a good amateur footballer but had no time for the Rangers v Celtic pantomime that dominated the local area so as a nipper he took me to watch Kilmarnock. A bit like Leicester, they had somehow managed to win the league in 1964-65, the year of my birth. But that was very much the highlight. It was downhill from there Essentially the local standing joke was that you went to watch Killie cos you couldn't get into Ibrox.
Whatever the case, I was brought up on a diet of well intentioned second best, watched by a small band of supporters who genuinely cared about their local team regardless of the large scale tribalism that surrounded us. The football wasn't often great but I still have vivid memories of my heros. Eddie Morrison, Davie Provan, Gordon Smith, Jim Stewart, Georgie Maxwell (scorer of the sweetest 25 yard volley I've ever seen), some of whom went on to bigger and better things. Rugby Park was a dump, but it was home.
The other element of local history that is relevant, is that in those days, because of our location in the hills on the west coast, we could pick up Ulster Television, so I was able to watch The Big Match with Brian Moore on a Sunday. In those days, the staple diet for the main game was either West Ham or Fulham (in the Best and Moore era). But Charlton featured occasionally. So I developed a soft spot for London teams.
After university I moved to London in 86. In search of a team to support I spent the mornings reading the paper to find out which game I fancied and then popped along to pay my fiver to stand on the terraces at whatever game took my fancy. Innocent days indeed! I never really developed an attachment to any team in particular but by this point Charlton had been chucked out of the Valley and I sympathetically recalled those images on Ulster TV of Alan Simonsson and Derek Hales. My "big break" came in 88 when I moved to Dartford and my next door neighbour was an Addick fanatic (he still sits near me in the West Upper). He took me to my first game against Bolton in 92 I think it was. We had to walk across the foundations of the east stand to get to the Jimmy seed where we sat. Charlton won 3-0 despite being played offf the park with fatty Garland scoring a 30 yard screamer at the coveted end. (Coveted is a typo but it kinda works!)
I'd love to say I was hooked, but actually it was a slow burner. I went to a few games over the next year or two but came slowly to realise that this was the football I wanted to watch. Not the big corporate faceless premier league stuff (things were heading that way by this stage), and I began to feel very similarly to how I had done about Killie all those years before.
I finally took the plunge when I was trying to do to my own young sons what my father had done to me. Sadly, their attraction was but a fleeting dalliance, but I've been going ever since. Why Charlton? Well it just feels "normal". Proper football played by players I can identify with and the comfort of home that is the Valley. And for the majority of my time, it has felt like a family business. Maybe not always very professionally run, but always with feeling and with the right values.
I got the tail end of the premiership years. We struggled, but always took pride in the fact that we were the model family club. Even after we got relegated and splashed the cash on Dowie and Pardew, we did it with a kind of well meaning innocence. 11-12 was just heaven. A group of players that I'd recognise in the street and a manager who, whilst not perfect, really got what Charlton meant and was one of us.
By the time the current regime took over I was falling out of love with football bigstyle. The money, the influx of overseas prima donnas, the influence of the premier league etc. Roland's plans to grow his own and to hell with the agents all seemed like the next natural chapter in the story of my club. It took about six months before I realised he was bonkers and for his odious sidekick to piss me off. Things feel as though we might be turning a corner again. I’ve enjoyed this season and the day can’t be far off when the curse is removed.
That's "my Charlton" folks. Sorry to be so indulgent
Got to about 12/13 and was fascinated by the turmoil at Charlton, kicked out of the Valley but battling for promotion. Love an underdog and i' d found my home. Rode up on my bike to a deserted Valley and snuck in to soak up the atmosphere of a desolate terrace and head high weeds. Sad but serene.
Later found out Charlton were my dad's team and he was one of the lost fans from the seventies. Must be in the blood.
Draw a line on the map of England from E to W Along the Thames line. Who is the biggest club.
My sons didn't have a choice, even though by the time they were born we lived in Kent. I kept our season tickets even after we moved up t'north 10 years ago but haven't been to many games in the last few seasons.
And that was that, I was hooked from that day. Looking back, I think it was the Valley itself that lured me. Yes, Highbury was all very grand and the perfect football stadium back then but those towering terraces just had something about them.
I have tears in my eyes even writing that. I love my club. It's so much more than football.
Roland Out.
COYR.
You know, sod the boycott, Im going today!, Up the Addicks.
30 years rolled by in more or less constant obscurity until we reached the top flight again in the late 80s but by this time we had become homeless. Now another 30 years have come and gone. In that time we've had some really great times and more recently some record bad years.
Supporting Charlton has necessarily but too often been about events off the pitch, or even whether we have have a pitch to play on at all. But I wouldn't want to support the Woolwich rejects - arguing with each other, angsting, and ringing the call-in programmes year after year about whether they are going to finish in the top 4 or not. How dull would that be.