Heritage Society at Swindon Town
Keith Coatsworth and Paul Hedges write: “We have setup the website, created a charity, have a board of trustees that include the CEO of STFC, Trust STFC board members and members of the official supporters’ club as well as the club’s historian – so hopefully quite well set up.
In the long term we are looking to create a museum room but also adopt a similar approach to Exeter City with a stadium-wide approach.
John Trollope MBE was officially announced as the first honorary president of the Museum (https://stfcmuseum.org/). His achievement of playing 870 league games for Swindon, still a Football League record, was celebrated along with his 80th Birthday. Local dignitaries including members of parliament, the Mayor and other past players such as Don Rogers, Keith Morgan, Fraser Digby, Paul Bodin and Phil King also attended, funds were raised and great publicity gained.
Subsequently, a number of volunteers were invited by the Club to sort through copious memorabilia and artefacts buried in storage areas not visited for decades. Along with framed international caps for past players there were literally hundreds of old videos and CD’s, signed shirts from the premier league play off and dozens of pictures and trophies.
Together with artefacts already on display at the club, but not previously accurately described, everything is being listed and photographed in readiness for future displays.
We hope to locate match programmes from every past game home and away; so far more than 6,000 have been documented in an attempt to create one copy for display and a duplicate to be archived.
An initiative called the “1969 Project” was set up to create a documentary celebrating not only the football achievement of winning the League Cup, beating Arsenal 3-1 in the Wembley final, but featuring personal recollections from fans and the community-wide impact it created.
In addition, we’re working to create a stadium-wide display of key historical moments in the club’s history – to enhance the matchday experience, engage with as many fans as possible and raise the profile of the museum. All this work is as much about preserving the history and heritage of Swindon Town Football Club as it is simply creating a museum.
Visit here: Swindon Town FC Museum | Official
May/September 2023