Burton Albion were formed in July 1950, after a public meeting agreed it was high time the town had a football team. Burton-Upon-Trent did have teams before that, Burton Wanderers, Swifts, United and Town, but the war meant football was AWOL for 10 years and so a new team to represent the town was needed, and Burton Albion was born. 58 years later Albion make it onto my site by being promoted to the football league and whatever happens, here they will stay.
The image on Burton’s badge is as old as the club, although it was only introduced in 2005. (PIC 1) In 2005 Burton Albion moved into their new purpose-built home the Pirelli Stadium and a new badge was unveiled to coincide with that move. It is a shield in the club colours and the sides give it depth. In the chief of the shield is the club nickname “The Brewers”, and below the formation date of 1950. In the centre is a rather stout footballer with a nice beer belly made up of the club initials BA, and he kicks a football with the letters FC inside making up the initials for Burton Albion FC. As I mentioned this fat fella has been around since the club was formed although not as a badge.
He appeared on the early programmes along with the initials BAFC highlighted. (PIC 2) This example is from the first season of the club and cost 3d, that’s equal to one and a quarter pence in today’s money. He first made his comeback in 1994; 44 years after his first appearance, and he is still playing today even with the beer belly. In the early 70s, Burton sported the town coat of arms on their shirts. (PIC 3) The arms were officially granted in 1878. Burton-Upon-Trent Borough was formed in 1878 and was comprised of Burton, Burton Extra, Horninglow, Stapenhill and Winshill. The Burton-Upon-Trent County Borough was granted the coat of arms by Norroy, King of Arms at the College of Arms. They depicted the spread eagle from the Paget family arms and the fleur-de-lys from the Bass family, the most famous brewing family in the country. The two wavy blue lines represent the rivers, Trent and Dove, which meet near Burton. In April 1928 a crest was added which has a mural crown representing a walled town or city and raising from it a hand holding the saltire of Saint Andrew as an allusion to the early medieval chapel on Andresey Island founded by Saint Modwen. The motto “HONOR ALIT ARTES” is a quotation by Roman Statesman, Cicero, meaning, Honour Sustains the Arts. Cicero was born 106 years before Christ and has been traditionally considered the master of Latin prose, or in this case the Latin motto, with Quintilian declaring that Cicero was: “Not the name of a man, but of eloquence itself.” The English word Ciceronian meaning eloquent derives from his name, although I ain’t blinking heard of it. After the arms fell out of favour in the 1980s a new badge was unveiled. (PIC 3) In the club colours, it has inside an 18th Century brewer with a barrel of XXX on his shoulder and a tankard of the stuff itself in the other hand.
The Bass Brewery was founded in 1777 in Burton-Upon-Trent and 100 years later was the largest brewery in the world. Beer used to be brewed by women at home for the family, and as a way of earning a few extra pennies selling the beer from home and giving rise to the public house or pub as it is more commonly known. It would only last a couple of days before going off so she always had some on the go. Britain had colonies all over the place and particularly in India and the large number of soldiers wanted a beer, but it would go off before it got there so a beer needed inventing that would travel well. Giant breweries like Bass could afford the best men in the business and brewers started to realise that the higher the alcohol content the longer it would last and the less time roasting the hops the lighter and more refreshing it would be. So along with the inventions of thermometers and hydrometers, brewers were able to brew beers that would last the journey time to India and longer and so was born the IPA, India Pale Ale. This helped Burton-Upon-Trent to become known worldwide and Bass had its own Bass Pale Ale copyrighted.
“The Brewers” have their own brewer come match days and he is the club mascot Billy the Brewer. (PIC 4) The picture shows him coming home from the pub late one night. Just kidding I was messing around with the paint app after I got home from the pub late one night, but that is him and the actual fixed grin on his face is real, win, lose or draw. The name Burton is an Anglo-Saxon place name meaning, fortified town. This is from the words, burh meaning a fort, and tun meaning a settlement, and of course, it is upon the river Trent. As I mentioned home is the Pirelli Stadium of Albion and it holds 6,912 fans all as sober as Billy the mascot. Local rivals include the two Nottinghams, Derby County and Stoke City. If you are interested in finding out more on “The Brewers” then organise a little knees-up at, www.burtonalbionfc.co.uk
