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Supporters Club Membership

www.dfcsc.co.uk

Darlington F.C. Supporters Club was re-born during the 1987-88 season after a suggestion by the late Archie Heaton that the Football Club needed a fans organisation.

The historic first meeting was held in the Vice Presidents room in the old East Stand. The result of the meeting was that David Hutchinson was elected as Chairman, Dennis Leet as Vice Chairman, Atkin Chamberlin as Treasurer and Irene Chamberlin as Secretary, along with an elected Committee. Over the past 15 or so years, the Supporters Club has seen many Committee members come and go but one thing everyone had in common was a love of Darlington Football Club and a belief that the Supporters Club could make a major contribution to the running of our Club.

The main aims of the Supporters Club when it was formed were to raise much-needed funds for the Football Club and to provide a service for our members. In the early days, we used to present a large cheque to the current Chairman on the pitch before the last home game of the season. How times have changed. Over the years, we have donated many different items to the Football Club, including grass seeds, line markers and the most recent which fans will identify with, is the TV, which currently stands in Strikers Bar. We regularly sponsor players during the season and sponsor matches when funds allow. We have always tried to work closely with the management of the Football Club in a positive way and many people have given up a great deal of their spare time to help out on match days, including the selling of 50-50 tickets, selling match day programmes, and most notably, a commitment to work in the Club Shop for a four-year period. It's worth noting that not all the "helpers" of the Supporters Club were Committee members; we have had very many offers of help from genuine fans over the years all wanting to lend a hand in any way they could.

Raising funds has always been the most important part of the Supporters Club work. We have raised funds in many different ways other than the usual raffles. We have taken a stall at Darlington Market on the nearest Saturday to Christmas and using donated toys, unwanted presents etc. raised money by selling our "stock". For a number of years, we ran a very successful 100 Club which raised much needed funds on a monthly basis. We have produced tee shirts, polo shirts, baseball caps and many other types of memorabilia, which have all proved popular. One our of most popular Committee members, the late and very much missed Gordon Soulsby, successfully ran the Buster for a number of years. Gordon also used to run a very successful "match ball raffle" on every home match day. This did become something of an institution! The Buster has recently been resurrected and is now run by Tom Finney and it is proving just as popular as when Gordon first began this venture.

We have held many events over the years, including race nights, Christmas Disco's, Player of the Year Award Nights with the most successful being our 10th Anniversary Dinner, which we held at Blackwell Grange in March 1998. Many faces from the previous 10 years attended that night from ex-players to ex-Chief Executives; that is one of the main strengths of the Supporters Club, to bring people together from different areas of our Club no matter who they are.

The most successful venture the Supporters Club have ever undertaken was that of running coaches to all away games. This began a few weeks after the formation of the organisation. One of the first trips I can remember travelling on was to Scarborough on an old United coach, which I am sure was a service coach given to us for the day! It's good to know that things have moved on slightly since then and we now have an excellent working relationship with our current supplier, Atkinsons of Ingleby Arncliffe. The coaches have always been well supported and it is great to see that this is still the case 15 years later.

We will continue as an organisation to work closely and positively with the management of our Football Club to ensure that all our members are represented at all levels. We plan to be around for a few more years yet so to all those members who have supported us by attending events; to those who have helped us for no payment over the years; and to those who will continue to support us into the future we would all like to say a big thank you for helping to make the Supporters Club the success story it is.

Cheers

The dfcsc.co.uk team

The Supporters Club football team has been run by Steve Robinson for more years than anyone cares to remember and is still extremely successful 15 years on. Steve works extremely hard to encourage our members to take part and has built up a good nucleus of players willing to travel far and wide to represent the Supporters Club. He has also forged excellent relationships with many clubs throughout the country when trying to arrange friendly games for the team.

The Junior Quakers was set up approximately 12 years ago with the help of Ian Leckie. This section was aimed at our under 16 fans and has proved popular over the years. In the early days, we provided football coaching in the Quaker Centre before every home match, aided by Ian Leckie and his team. More recently, a great deal of work has been carried out by Sue Thorns, Lynn Jasper and many others in hosting the monthly Junior Quakers nights held in Strikers. The Juniors have also played host to other Junior Supporters around the country by hosting match day buffets and welcoming families into our Football Club. A spin off from the Junior Qukers, The Family Room, was originally under the West Stand. This was successfully run by the Supporters Club for many years during the 90's and was a base for the Junior Quakers on match days, as well as welcoming their families. It was an extremely popular meeting point for families to enjoy a half time or full-time drink and a chat.

Feethams

1883 - 2003

With such a colourful history behind it, The Supporters Club has this season gone through a period of quite dramatic change. During October 2002 our most recent Chairman, Peter Thorns and his wife Sue, decided to retire to concentrate on other projects. This left us with a dilemma as to our future, but as everyone is now well aware, we have been successfully operating during this time without a recognised Chairman and running as a highly motivated democratic group. It is a tribute to the strength of our current Committee and the standing of the Supporters Club within our Football Club that it has survived. It has not only survived but has continued to grow and move forward to embrace the future of our Football Club.