Bradford City A.F.C. was founded in Bradford, England, in 1903, bringing an association football club to the West Riding of Yorkshire as an alternative to rugby league. They were immediately elected to the Football League to replace Doncaster Rovers in Division Two, and made their permanent home in the Valley Parade stadium. Under the management of Peter O'Rourke the club won promotion to Division One in 1908, and the FA Cup in 1911 (team pictured). After subsequent relegations, they remained in the third and fourth tiers of the English football league system until 1985–86. During that time, they endured several periods of financial hardship, and in 1985, their ground suffered a disastrous fire in which 56 people died. After coming close to returning to the top division of the League in 1987–88, the club enjoyed mixed fortunes before finally achieving promotion to the Premier League in 1998–99. After two seasons in the top tier, the club's playing and financial misfortunes multiplied; successive relegations saw them fall into the bottom tier of The Football League, before promotion in 2012–13 brought them back up a division.
Read more: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Bradford_City_A.F.C.
_______________________________ Today's selected anniversaries:
306:
Roman Herculian guard Adrian of Nicomedia, who had converted to Christianity after being impressed with the faith of Christians that he had been torturing, was martyred. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adrian_and_Natalia_of_Nicomedia
1681:
King Charles II of England granted Quaker William Penn a charter for the Pennsylvania Colony. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Penn
1899:
Cyclone Mahina struck Bathurst Bay, Queensland, killing over 400 people, the deadliest natural disaster in Australian history. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyclone_Mahina
1918:
The first known case of the so-called Spanish flu was first observed at Fort Riley, Kansas. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1918_flu_pandemic
1980:
Robert Mugabe of the Zimbabwe African National Union was elected to head the first government in Zimbabwe. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Mugabe
_____________________________ Wiktionary's word of the day:
philtrum: The shallow groove running down the center of the outer surface of the upper lip. https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/philtrum
___________________________ Wikiquote quote of the day:
The problem of Eternity, of which the face of the Sphinx speaks, takes us into the realm of the impossible. Even the problem of Time is simple in comparison with the problem of Eternity. --P. D. Ouspensky https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/P._D._Ouspensky