DFC’s 120 Glorious Years!!
“Welcome! thrice welcome! to the year 1893, For it is the year that I intend to leave Dundee.”, wrote poet William McGonagall in his New Years Resolution poem but if he did so, then he would have been unfortunate enough to miss the birth of Dundee Football Club who were founded that year and their first ever game which was played at West Craigie Park against Glasgow Rangers on August 12th.
Dundee F.C. were formed from the amalgamation of two local clubs Our Boys and East End and their merger formed the basis of an application to join the three year old Scottish Football League into which they were admitted in June 1893.
Their first match took place therefore at the home of Our Boys with their colours being the sky blue and white strips of East End and on the ‘Glorious Twelfth’, Dundee’s first match of 120 glorious years ended 3-3 with Sandy Gilligan having the honour of scoring the Club’s first goal.
By the end of their debut season, Dundee had moved to a new ground at the city docks at Carolina Port where a smoking slag heap on the adjacent Gas works on the Broughty Ferry Road side, nicknamed the ‘Burning Mountain’ often gave hundreds of fans, a free view of the game.
In March 1894, goalkeeper Bill March, centre-half William ‘Plum’ Longair and left-winger Sandy Keillor became the first Dundee players to represent Scotland in a 2-1 victory over Ireland in Belfast and two years later Keillor became the first Dundee player to score for Scotland in a 4-0 triumph over Wales in the first and only international to be held at Carolina Port.
‘The Port’ had a superb playing surface but it was too remote, with no public transport links and in 1899, Dundee moved to their current home of Dens Park. Dens Park was officially opened against St. Bernards on August 19th 1899 when Fred McDiarmid was awarded with a medal for scoring the first goal on the new ground and the move was the start of the good times for The Dee.