I attended this Sporting Heroes event at Odsal Stadium today, at the invitation of the West Yorkshire Archive Service. There was memorabilia from the Bulls, City and Park Avenue and some interesting archive material.
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| John Mason of the Bulls Foundation, who leads The Past Times Project, holds the Cup along with me. |
Sporting heritage is an area which surprisingly, is rarely given sufficient attention, even though sport has a massive impact on the lives of most people, either as participants or spectators. Sport brings great pleasure to families with a family member who takes part, as was the case with our family. Our son Sean had a 10 year career in junior football including 4 years as a Bradford City junior player at the centre of excellence and the family rarely missed a match. At university, he chose to play rugby union. Our past sporting heroes are great role models and inspire young people to be active and keep fit and to live responsible lives.
It was very interesting seeing a DVD showing all the sporting events that use to take place at Odsal such as speedway motor cycle racing and stock car races. The stadium was used for tennis tournaments in the1930s and Bradford City played their home matches there, following the fire in1984.
It was interesting to hear about the heritage project that the Bulls are undertaking, which includes capturing the memories of players and fans. Also, great to get the chance to pose with the Rugby League Cup, even though it was a replica.
The most interesting part of the exhibition was the display dedicated to lieutenant Donald Bell, a Bradford Park Avenue player who died in the battle of the Somme in 1916 and was awarded the Victoria Cross for valour. He is the only professional footballer to be awarded the Victoria Cross and the FA have bought it so it can be publicly displayed.
I hope sport fans in Bradford, take the opportunity to visit the exhibition.
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