Magazine Review: Black & Gold – The magazine of the Aberdeen FC Heritage Trust (Issue 3/May 2021)
Whilst lockdown deprived football fans of their ‘live’ fix of their team, it spurred a wave of creativity amongst supporters who looked to stay in touch and connect with those they went to games with week in, week out, until COVID struck. Indeed this was the inspiration behind Black & Gold, a magazine setup by Peter Elliot with the Aberdeen FC Heritage Trust.
Peter explains: “I set the mag up with the Trust to engage with the wider Dons support during the lockdown last year (2020). Seeing a lot of older film footage and other material shared by fans of all clubs opened up the fact that football fans were interested in historical writing. There’s a great team of contributors to the magazine who have their own interests, either in players, grounds, memorabilia or general reminiscences.”
The first issue landed in November 2020, with a second in February 2021 and the third edition (reviewed here) in May 2021. First things first, for many if not most people outside of Aberdeen, when you think of the club who ply their trade at the Pittodrie Stadium, you associate the side as playing in all red, as worn by the likes of Willie Miller, Alex McLeish and Gordon Strachan. However, at the turn of the Twentieth Century and up until the Second World War, The Dons wore black and gold strips, hence the name of the magazine.
Content wise there are thirteen articles, which range from more general football content such as book reviews to the Aberdeen focused pieces which look at players (Donald Colman, Alex Jackson and Chic McLelland), seasons (1939/40) and competitions (participation in the Tennents Sixes and UEFA Cup and Cup Winners ties in Belgium), from the past. The magazine though is not solely focused on the past, with articles on the present such as AFC Milestones, which round up statistical details and news in respect of players and games since the last issue, and an interview with Paine Profitt an artist who has provided covers for The Dons matchday programme.
Unquestionably Black & Gold is aimed at Aberdeen fans, but the well written and well researched articles contained within the 44 pages of this glossy and attractively presented magazine will appeal to anyone interested in football history and indeed the social history of the game.
(Publication date: May 2021. 44 pages)
For more information and copies of the magazine:
Website – www.firstdonsmatch.bigcartel.com/category/magazines
Twitter – @AFCHeritage
In an age when Sky would have football fans believe that the game only existed with the inception in the 1992/93 season of the Premier League, it is a relief to come across a publication that redresses the balance and which looks at the game and its history from its origins in the Victorian era up to the 1980s.
There may not be a professional football club in Cornwall – the nearest teams in the Football League are Plymouth Argyle and Exeter City, both in Devon – but the game is very much alive in the South West peninsula county. Helping promote the football landscape in the area is, Cornish Soccer: The voice of football in the Duchy, a twenty-eight page glossy magazine (priced £2, plus postage).