A little introduction, a thank you, and a WIN A FOREST SHIRT COMPETITION

Can’t remember the date, but apparently the same as the completion of the London sewage system, the end of the American Civil War and the abolishment of slavery in the US.

Also if you add the numbers together you get 20 which is the shirt number of Jota. But Jota is an anagram of toja, and you’d have to be a bit of a dick to get a newly won forest shirt of a player one might assume would never play for us again.

Battle of the Tanais River: Where the Huns defeat the Alans near the Don. I mean, make your own jokes here but this happened in 373AD. 373 is a fifth of 1865, and this will be our 5th season back in the premiership and likely what position we will finish in this season… 5 is also the amount of syllables in the date I can’t seem to remember.

Oh, and Nottingham Forest Football Club was formed. Twas a very good year indeed.
 
Nurse! He's got out again!!😆
 
1866 😇

As someone who reads a lot and posts less often, many thanks to you and the other admins for all the joy I get from these pages.

The following is AI-assisted and almost certainly wrong.

The case for 1866


The conventional 1865 date rests almost entirely on an undocumented or poorly documented private meeting of shinney/shinty players at the Clinton Arms. No contemporary newspaper report, minute book, or other primary source from 1865 confirms that meeting occurred, let alone that it formally constituted a football club. The earliest verifiable public evidence of the club’s existence is from 1866:


• A newspaper advertisement in the Nottingham Journal on 17 February 1866 inviting players to “The Nottingham Forest Foot-Ball Club” for Saturday kick-offs on the Forest Cricket Ground. This is the first known printed use of the club’s name in a football context.


• The first recorded match, against Notts County, on 22 March 1866 at the Forest Recreation Ground.


Several accounts explicitly describe a transitional period after the alleged 1865 meeting: the group continued some shinney activity, only later dropping it, establishing a proper committee, and fully adopting the name “Nottingham Forest Football Club.” One description notes that it “took a few months after that meeting… to develop into what might be described as an organised football club,” with the public organisation becoming clear only in early 1866. nytimes.com


In the historiography of early football clubs, formation dates are frequently anchored to the first public activity, first match, or first contemporary documentary evidence rather than an informal private discussion. Applying that standard strictly here would place the club’s effective birth in 1866. The 1865–66 season is sometimes treated as the “first season in existence,” yet all documented football activity falls in the 1866 calendar year. The EFL itself has noted that Forest were “formed at an unknown date in 1865, and documented as playing its first games in 1866,” which quietly acknowledges the documentary gap. stokesentinel.co.uk


In short: the 1865 meeting, if it occurred exactly as later tradition describes, was at best a provisional resolution by a shinney group. The club as a functioning, publicly identifiable football entity only appears in the historical record in 1866.
 
I would agree with the “almost certainly wrong” bit.

The AI feature itself refers to a “few months” after the initial meeting, so a reasonable degree of organisation could very well have happened while it was still 1865. The appeal for players to come along in mid-February 1866 also suggests the football club was reasonably established before then. The mention of the 1865-66 season is a bit daft as there weren’t sufficient established clubs or any formal league structure to have a season. Clearly the AI is slanted towards making a case for 1866 and no doubt AI could present a similarly (or more) persuasive case for 1865.

I note the only named source is the Stoke Sentinel. As most of us on here will know, Stoke City claim to have been founded in 1863 and thus have a vested interest in our not being older than them, an issue which surfaced in the media a few years ago. A totally independent football historian disputed their founding in 1863, as the same club hasn’t been playing since then. I remember looking it up at the time and it seemed that while there was a club formed then it didn’t survive and, from memory, there was a hiatus of a few years and a merger of two nascent clubs before what is now Stoke City came on the scene. In other words, they are claiming it to be the same club despite a gap of several years and a merger.

I’m sure IRTD will be able to add something more authoritative, as I haven’t the time to go back and re-do the limited research I did at the time.

And yes, I know you were only offering 1866 to be entertaining/contrary, but I am proud of Nottingham’s football heritage and our claim to having the two oldest league teams in the world (though for some reason, Crystal Palace and Wrexham both seem to have suddenly remembered in recent years that they are older than their long-accepted founding dates…).
 
Don Wright's outside and wants a word!
9047.jpg
 
Lorraine said:
Hello everyone,

For those who don’t know me, I thought it was about time I introduced myself.

My name is Lorraine, and I’m StuC’s wife.

Some of you may know Stuart well from his time on the forum, while others may simply know his name. Following his death, I’ve been quietly looking after things behind the scenes, and I wanted to take this opportunity to finally say hello and, most importantly, to say a huge thank you for the LTLF community who help make the forum what it is.

I’d also like to thank the Forest Forum admin team for everything they do to keep the forum running. It’s a huge amount of work, much of it happening quietly in the background, and I know how much time and effort goes into keeping this community going. It really is appreciated.

I wanted to do something positive for the forum and, being Nottingham Forest through and through, what better way than with a little competition?

🏆 WIN A NEW NOTTINGHAM FOREST SHIRT! 🔴⚪

The question is very simple:

What year were Nottingham Forest Football Club formed?

If you get the answer correct, your name will be entered into the draw to win the New Season Nottingham Forest shirt.

There will be one entry per forum user.

The winner will be able to choose either the home or away shirt, and if you’d like, you can also have a name and number added to it.

So, all you need to do is post your answer below.

Good luck everyone — and thank you again for making Forest Forum the community that it is.

Come on you Reds! ❤️

Closing Date for entries is 31st August 2026.
Click to expand...
1865 - and thanks for keeping going Lorraine. Away Fan comments brighten my Monday every week!
 
Lorraine said:
Hello everyone,

For those who don’t know me, I thought it was about time I introduced myself.

My name is Lorraine, and I’m StuC’s wife.

Some of you may know Stuart well from his time on the forum, while others may simply know his name. Following his death, I’ve been quietly looking after things behind the scenes, and I wanted to take this opportunity to finally say hello and, most importantly, to say a huge thank you for the LTLF community who help make the forum what it is.

I’d also like to thank the Forest Forum admin team for everything they do to keep the forum running. It’s a huge amount of work, much of it happening quietly in the background, and I know how much time and effort goes into keeping this community going. It really is appreciated.

I wanted to do something positive for the forum and, being Nottingham Forest through and through, what better way than with a little competition?

🏆 WIN A NEW NOTTINGHAM FOREST SHIRT! 🔴⚪

The question is very simple:

What year were Nottingham Forest Football Club formed?

If you get the answer correct, your name will be entered into the draw to win the New Season Nottingham Forest shirt.

There will be one entry per forum user.

The winner will be able to choose either the home or away shirt, and if you’d like, you can also have a name and number added to it.

So, all you need to do is post your answer below.

Good luck everyone — and thank you again for making Forest Forum the community that it is.

Come on you Reds! ❤️

Closing Date for entries is 31st August 2026.
Click to expand...
1865
 
psycho said:
• A newspaper advertisement in the Nottingham Journal on 17 February 1866 inviting players to “The Nottingham Forest Foot-Ball Club” for Saturday kick-offs on the Forest Cricket Ground. This is the first known printed use of the club’s name in a football context.
Click to expand...
There is a slightly earlier mention of The Nottingham Forest Football Club than mentioned above and as ISMGL says below there would have been time required before this to organize things, not least deciding on the rules they would play, gathering people together who wanted to play and not least they would have wanted to practice playing before trying to attract people to watch them play. I would imagine that setting things in motion would take more than 6 weeks.

(Nottingham Journal – Tuesday, February 13, 1866)

1787934786037.png


Ian Moore Gone Little said:
I would agree with the “almost certainly wrong” bit.

The AI feature itself refers to a “few months” after the initial meeting, so a reasonable degree of organisation could very well have happened while it was still 1865. The appeal for players to come along in mid-February 1866 also suggests the football club was reasonably established before then. The mention of the 1865-66 season is a bit daft as there weren’t sufficient established clubs or any formal league structure to have a season. Clearly the AI is slanted towards making a case for 1866 and no doubt AI could present a similarly (or more) persuasive case for 1865.

I note the only named source is the Stoke Sentinel. As most of us on here will know, Stoke City claim to have been founded in 1863 and thus have a vested interest in our not being older than them, an issue which surfaced in the media a few years ago. A totally independent football historian disputed their founding in 1863, as the same club hasn’t been playing since then. I remember looking it up at the time and it seemed that while there was a club formed then it didn’t survive and, from memory, there was a hiatus of a few years and a merger of two nascent clubs before what is now Stoke City came on the scene. In other words, they are claiming it to be the same club despite a gap of several years and a merger.

I’m sure IRTD will be able to add something more authoritative, as I haven’t the time to go back and re-do the limited research I did at the time.

And yes, I know you were only offering 1866 to be entertaining/contrary, but I am proud of Nottingham’s football heritage and our claim to having the two oldest league teams in the world (though for some reason, Crystal Palace and Wrexham both seem to have suddenly remembered in recent years that they are older than their long-accepted founding dates…).
Click to expand...
I agree that time would be needed to ensure that they could put aon a game worth watching before advertising for people to come and watch.

Regarding Stoke I did look at it a few years ago. I don't remember everything but I think the contention was that Stoke originated from a company's football team and had a different name. Someone had said that they later became Stoke, but there were a number of years of inactivity. In 1908 Stoke went to wall but within days money was raised to start them up again. I think that all of the players who had represented them in the second division at the time left for other clubs.

Hopefully I have remembered that correctly. I can't see what I wrote at the time. They aren't Forest are they so they don't really matter. ;)
 
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