Time to celebrate something

Let's hope the current squad can take some belief and endearment from Dixies achievements, into the rest of this season from Dixie's example.Tom Davies does look like he's gonna be a hell of a player and has an old head on young shoulders.

Here's to a good second half of the season.

They don't make them like that anymore.

10,000-1 odds from the bookies! Wish I had a time machine!

Raise a glass to Dixie!

And those odds from the bookies will never be repeated again either. Has there ever been any record of any actually takers of that offer??

"He belongs to the company of the supremely great, like Beethoven, Shakespeare and Rembrandt" - Bill Shankly.

According to his biographer, carrying his boots, he got the No 19 tram from the Pier Head to Goodison on the day of the Arsenal game.

What a story!

I would like to see EFC (perhaps with the backing of Evertonian MP Andy Burnham) mount a campaign to have Dixie posthumously recognised – perhaps Lyndon and Michael could get the ball rolling by contacting our Club.

I'm not sure if a knighthood can be awarded posthumously but doesn't Sir William Ralph Dean sound good? Better still, Lord Dean of Everton?!

If nothing is/can be done then the FA should be lobbied to somehow recognise his achievements

Martin I know you have Dixie and his families best interest at heart, but reading about Dixie and his humility I'm not sure he would have wanted the sort of honour you are advocating, l'm sure the way he was idolised by football fans everywhere would have been enough for him.

If TW readers will indulge me for a personal memory; my grandad was born in 1888 in Chester. From the age of 14 he used to walk every day to work in the shipyards at Birkenhead and back again to Chester. In 1907, the year of Dixie's birth, he moved to Liverpool where he worked on Garston docks. The lads he worked with in Birkenhead and Garston were all Evertonians and when he could afford it my grandad would be at Goodison on matchdays.

He was one of the "lucky" ones who survived the carnage of 4 years fighting in the First World war, but some wounds are not visible and he had come back a different man. He could no longer bear being in big crowds or face loud noise all around him, which is why he became a gardner (at Speke Hall) and hardly ever went to the match any more.

In 1925 my grandfather's only child (my Dad) was born and even though he could not subject himself to the crowds and the noise, like any Evertonian he resolved to make sure that his son was brought up correctly. With that in mind and knowing he must pass on to his son the stories of the great deeds and glory of Everton Football Club my grandad found himself outside of Goodison Park on May 5th 1928. In my Dad's telling of this story to me many years later he was not sure if my grandad was avoiding the deafening roars inside or, more likely, he could not afford to pay to get in. In any event when a pass gate opened near to where he stood my grandad dived into the gap just so he could say, "I was there on the day Dixie scored his 60th!"

My own Dad was there when Everton became Champions in 1939, he joined the Royal Navy at 17 and returned from his war to become a lifelong season ticket holder. Naturally he also ensured that his children were Blues and as his eldest I was taken to my first match in 1958. Recent articles on TW brought back many memories of the players of that era, and I am glad that Tommy Ring is remembered so fondly but, for what its worth, while I worshipped Vernon and Young, and later Royle and Kendall, Reid and Sheedy there are only 4 players in my lifetime who in my opinion were world-class on their day; The Great Ramon, The Ball of Fire, The White Pele and the man who was shamefully negelected by EFC for far too long: Tony Kay.

But I digress; in the late 1950's/early 60's money was till tight for working families in Liverpool. For us a week's holiday in Chester staying with a cousin of my Dad was as good as any foreign, exotic holiday today. During one such Summer week I was with my Dad in Chester town centre and he must have fancied a pint. He told me to wait for a moment while he went inside the pub. A minute later he came out and picked me up and we went inside.

What struck me first was how dark it was inside compared to the sunny day outside. Then my Dad sat me on the edge of the bar and a man in the most brilliant white shining shirt with the sleeves rolled up lifted me over the bar and started showing me medals and caps. He was a powerful man but so gentle with me as a child. He gave me a glass of lemonade and said, "So you're Fred's grandson? I hope you're as good an Evertonian as he is!"

The pub was the Dublin Packet and the man behind the bar was Dixie Dean. My Dad had asked Dixie if he recalled the name of my grandad Fred who'd joined up in 1914 with one of his Evertonian mates from his Birkenhead days who was a relative (I think an Uncle) of the great man. Whether he actually recalled the name or not Dixie was a real gentleman towards me and my Dad and he and I and now my own sons could never support anyone other than the grand old team. We have the history in this city.

"From the age of 14 he used to walk every day to work in the shipyards at Birkenhead and back again to Chester."

Very humbling for me that - what a man! Talk about unsung heroes.

At the end of Dixie's time he got suspended for punching our club secretary. Assuming that's the role Elstone now holds I wonder if Lukaku is anyway inspired by history?

I will raise a glass to the legend Dixie Dean

Maybe Bill should take Rom through this great mans history if he hasn't already done so.

Men like your Granddad were constructed with a different spirit, a different mettle to people of today, and I include myself in that statement. How tough it must have been for our forefathers to just exist, let alone improve on the hand they were dealt.

Like you say, money was still tight in the early 1960s for many people and the cost of going the match, and taking your sons, was prohibitive. My family were bombed out in the war and my Mam and sisters ended up staying in a cottage on Hope Mountain which my Grandma owned, my Dad stayed in Liverpool on aircraft production at Speke. Consequently, after the War, they had to start again from scratch, insurance was nowhere near as common as it is today so they, literally, lost everything. Tough times for many.

Your Granddad, walking from Chester... did he go home for his dinner?

How about Notts County who had Dixie, Tommy and the great Hughie Gallagher who scored nearly a thousand league goals between them? Unfortunately Notts County got the three of them at the tail-end of their careers.

I take your point about Dixie's humility and it is one shared by my match going mates. My personal concern is that Dixie might not be as idolized or indeed as well-known around the world as we might think. This view is based on one specific incident...

Some years back, whilst in a bar in Tenerife, I got talking to an Arsenal fan to whom the name Dixie Dean meant nothing – absolutely shocking ... particularly given the part of his own club in the making of footballing history.

I have a number of mates around the country who support various clubs – as a matter of interest, I might ask each what they actually know of the great Dixie.

Hope he really sparked him.

1930s, I'm imagining Dixie holding his cap in his hands while standing outside a large polished oak door.

He knocks..

"Enter"

Inside is club secretary, Ivor Fortte-Yune, he's dressed in plus-fours, a three inch thick tweed jacket, a jaunty trilby and has a bag of golf clubs over his shoulder.

IF-Y: "Now look Dizzy or..whatever it is you call yourself, I'm very busy so let's cut to the chase - what's all this nonsense about a pay rise?"

DD: "Well sir, I did break the goalscoring record with 60 goals in a season, I've scored over 30 hat-tricks and I think it's fair to say I bring in the punt..."

IF-Y: "Yes, yes, I'm sure that's all jolly good, but I'm a rugger man myself and have no idea what any of that means. So listen why not be a good chap and drop this rise nonsense and just to show no hard feelings (flicks a tanner across the table) go and have a six penn'eth of chips or..whatever filth it is that you chaps eat..on me!"

BANG!!!!

Teeth and golf clubs akimbo, hair previously slapped down neatly (with half a pound of Blue Cap lard) now looking like the 'style' favoured by that John Moores looky-like out of A Flock Of Seagulls - Link

I remember my granddad telling us stories of this "super man" when my sister and I were kids, and it wasn't till he'd passed away that we were old enough to realise what he'd seen and thought of a million questions we wished we'd asked.

Gerard, great memories, thanks

I tended as all teenagers do to think my dad was exaggerating his own importance, but we went in and Mr Dean, I won't call him "Dixie" he didn't like that title, said, "Hello, Joe, what are you drinking?"

My dad introduced me and told him I was the only Evertonian Tarleton.

Mr Dean sat with us for a good hour after the pub closed drinking tea. He wasn't just humble, he was a really nice bloke. He spoke glowingly of Alex Young and told me to come and see him whenever I was over in Chester.

A gentleman and I treasure that afternoon, I'm over seventy now, but he made time for a kid and treated me with the utmost respect, congratulated me that I was off to university. He was a Corinthian and deserves to be honoured, not just for being a truly great footballer, but for being a special human-being.

I remember very, very fondly a night with my late Dad a few years ago, in the company of his great friend Dick White, my nephew James Corbett who was in the process of writing one of his tomes, I think the Everton Encyclopaedia, and a fine malt.

Uncle Dick recalled how he was given a sum of money, possibly sixpence, to go to the match of WR's 60th goal. He was four from the front of getting into the Boy's Pen when the gates closed. He sat on the pavement, weeping, at not being able to get into the ground. A man approached him and asked why he was crying, the young boy explained, and the man offered him sufficient money to get in one of the main turnstiles. "Today is the day Dean will score his 60th goal - you must see it".

The young boy had a dilemma. His father was a police sergeant, and had told him never to take money from an unknown man!

Uncle Dick took the money, got in to see the match, went home to confess to his father, who then set about trying to trace the man to thank him for is generosity.

When you see some of the people who have been bestowed with such an honour, it makes me mad when those such as WR Dean have not been recognised properly in their own lifetimes and are largely forgotten by the football public, when every young fan of any club should be aware of the man and his achievements.

Can a knighthood be awarded posthumously? if so Everton FC and Evertonians should campaign for WR Dean to be given that honour.

(sorry to appear nosey but as an interest, boxing is on a par with football for me)

As a kid, through my (late) dad, I knew all about Nel Tarleton and Ernie Roderick and Peter Kane (and Benny Lynch, Tommy Farr, Rinty Monaghan..)

We were also big fans of Joey 'the jab' Singleton and never missed him at the stadium.

In one paragraph Dixie was 21 the previous season, then later he had his 21st birthday during the season?

Camsell scored 59 the previous season, yet Dixie passed Ted Harper's league record of 43 goals set 2 seasons previous?

Maybe he still has those goals in his tank, to rifle in at an indeterminate date for the club he was born to play for. And for whom those 250 goals he would rather have scored.

#32

Just putting my carpentry tools down for one moment Dermot, Dean was a marvel in his day but celebrating the past will not garner trophies in the future. (though Dean is a special case I grant you)

If the day arrives when the stadium emerges in dockland and Rooney is brought in to spearhead a new dawn, then the ghost of the great man Dixie will be disembarking the Birkenhead ferry nearby smiling approvingly at what is to come.

I would like to think that Dixie would refuse any gong like those accepted by the morons who think that becoming a member of a non existent 'British Empire' is an honour. To Evertonians worldwide, Dixie Dean's greatest honour was to play the game he loved for the team he loved and the 'cloth cap and ARP rattle' thousands who idolised him. (I still have that rattle.)

I had great admiration for Ernie and his wife Edna. They had terrible financial advice and lost the pub they'd bought at Wrightington when the taxman caught up. They went from relative wealth to working-class life, Ernie worked as a stoker in the power station at Newsham Park, but they did it with dignity and without moaning.

Watching the boxing over the weekend and a commentator mentioned Archie Moore had a record 140 knockouts... ONE HUNDRED AND FORTY!

To have 140 fights never mind knockouts is unbelievable. Did Peter Kane fight at the home of our neighbours?

I went to the 84 Milk Cup Final by car with a mate of mine along with a good mate of his Lee Tarleton. As I recall he was a red. I know he was from your family... related to Nel. Would he be your son or your nephew perhaps?

Rinty Monaghan fought Joe Curran for a Brittish title fight and maybe a World title fight. When Joe died, some of Monty's family came over to Liverpool for the funeral including one of his daughters.

John G Davies – I'm sure Peter Kane fought at Anfield in the forties, some big fights were held there.

The great baseball player, Babe Ruth, who scored a record 60 home runs around the same time as Dixie scored his 60 league goals in a season, was amazed when he met Dixie, before a big football game, to learn that Dixie only received 㾸 per game. He said "This big crowd, loads who have come especially to see you and that's all you get?"

The irony is none of the players then, expected anything more than they were being paid. The further irony is they were slaves then on buttons and dozens of players now get more in a week than great players like Dixie earned in their entire career, and still don't think they are getting enough.

I doubt his record will ever be beaten but that's what they said about The Babe's record or Bob Beamon.

It makes me laugh when people try and minimise the players, and records, of old saying they wouldn't be able to compete in today's game. With the same conditioning, diets, health care etc, they bloody well would.

I was a bit too young to see Tiger but know he once fought a feller called Randy Sandy.

I also seem to remember a (pub) question about two word champion boxers who lived in the same street in Liverpool (not at the same time)

One was Tiger, the other was Bassey (but don't know the street and it could be bollocks).. Link

When I say Tiger was on the up I mean after a very poor record starting his career, I think he lost three or four of his first fights, he was putting a run of wins together, in fact I think he beat Randy Sandy in the return fight but it wasn't in Liverpool.

Dick had changed his manager and went on to win the middleweight and light heavy world titles, he lost a lot of his money when the Nigerian civil war took place, he belonged to the losing tribe and was barred from Nigeria after the war and lived in America.

The two fighters who lived in the same street were more than likely have been Dick Tiger and the late Hogan Kid Bassey. another favourite at the Stadium, one of his biggest supporters was the Labour MP Bessie Braddock who attended many of his fights, Hogan has a lot of family still living in Liverpool, although I believe he returned to live in Nigeria.

A time where injuries meant players were out for ages and sides might have several players off with them reduced to 9 or 8 men.

People now talk about brain trauma so that Dean living so long was a blessing having headed the ball so much in that era.

I was 2 when he passed and yet I still feel a connection thanks to my granddad.

The most important and best pre-war player there was.

I know where you're coming from about formal recognition for Dean, but it was a long time ago. The football world was more pure and unpretentious in Dixie's day, compared with the endless peripheral hype of today.

I imagine that most of the players back then were happy to recognize and be recognized by their peers within the game, and their loyal fans. The cups and trophies, all the cups and trophies, were the real prize. Awards from outside might have felt a bit uncomfortable and unseemly for sportsmen in those dignified times. People had given their lives in the war, after all.

Mind you, to play with those footballs, on some of those pitches, in those boots, for that money (or not)... I think they all deserved some kind of medal! A completely different world.

I must say though, I've spoken with quite a few kids and younger fans of other clubs that do know of Dixie Dean. The legend is still being shared.

It was equally appropriate that he suffered his fatal heart attack at a derby game at Goodison Park (which we probably lost, as usual!). As did the great Harry Catterick, if my mind serves me well (also probably another defeat!). I may stand to be corrected on these points but that is what I've always been led to believe and I do have some distant memory of both occurring.

As a side issue, didn't Dixie actually score 100 goals in all appearances in 1927-28? This included all EFC 1st team games and internationals. It may even have included the Liverpool Senior Cup which was taken seriously in those days.