Olivia Opara speaks to the grandson of Tottenham Hotspur club’s founder, Bobby Buckle

Tottenham Hotspur clock / Credit: Olivia Opara

On Wednesday, 14th June, a clock was reinstated on Tottenham High Road with a plaque, marking the location where a now-famous football club was founded in 1882. On the plaque is the name Robert “Bobby” Buckle, who at age 13 began what was then called Hotspur FC along with schoolmates Hamilton Casey, and John Anderson from Tottenham Grammar School.

Bobby’s grandson Michael Mackman says that his Hotspur-founding family are overjoyed that the clock is back on the High Road: “When I saw the plaque, I just felt absolutely chuffed to bits because that’s the first time that Bobby’s name has ever been publicly put anywhere on a structural building associated with the club.”

The Authorised Biography of Bobby Buckle published in 2020, written by Christopher South, the grandson of Bobby’s lifelong friend, Samuel South, details Bobby’s role as the driving force behind the club for its first 20 years. Bobby Buckle was one of the first members of Hotspur FC and its first captain – scoring the club’s first recorded goal in a friendly match against Grange Park in 1883.

Michael says: “One of the reasons why we did the biography is because his story and what he achieved in those 20 years from age 13 onwards is just remarkable and he founded what is now a multi-billion pound business and a leading club in England.”

During its early years, Bobby and the Spurs boys would meet in various Tottenham pubs such as The Eagle and The Golden Lion, before later meeting regularly at The Red House, which was owned by Joshua Pedley, a rich city lawyer and Bobby’s father’s employer. The Golden Lion is where Bobby would meet his wife, Ethel Brown, the stepdaughter of Alan Aisley, who owned the pubs.

The boys were supported by the local community and by Pedley, the “greatest benefactor” of the Buckle family. Michael’s grandmother, another football fan, star ted a Spurs scrapbook in the 1890s , taking cuttings from local newspapers. “Bobby kept up-to-date about everything Spurs till the end and during my time in college in London,”
recalls Michael. “I used to write letters to my grandmother about the Spurs matches I’d gone to and she would write back asking about particular players.”

The last chapter, ‘A stranger to Tottenham’, hints at Bobby being dismayed by the initial sale of the club’s shares as “only a third of the first takers were from Tottenham” – suggesting that he felt like the “ownership of ‘his’ club had left Tottenham”.

However, Michael says this was inevitable, due to the wealth of Tottenham at the time: “I suspect that that was part
of Bobby’s vision. You had to extend the attractiveness of the club beyond Tottenham if it was going to be a successful, nationally recognised team.

“Having said that, I think one of the most remarkable things about the club is that it grew out of its community. It was a bunch of lads who lived and played out on the marshes and it was the community that pulled together to allow them to set up the club and run it. If you look at where the club is now and its impact, I think that it is remarkable that it is still centred around that community.”

Going forward, Michael would like to see more recognition of his grandfather within the stadium grounds. An application for a Blue Heritage Plaque for Bobby has been made, with the support of the club.

“I am quite proud of my grandfather and he is one of the most remarkable people that I have ever come across,” says Michael.

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