Edinburgh

Sparta

 Amateur Boxing Club

Recollections

1.

John Houston

Dayton, Ohio, USA

The Club

Thank you to John Houston, Dayton, Ohio, USA who provided the photograph above and wrote:

"By the time this photograph was taken, around 1949, the Club membership had grown, and there were junior and senior groups.

 This is the junior (under 16) group.   Again, the photograph was taken at Broughton school.  

 John Houston:  Dayton, Ohio, USA, May 5, 2006

The Photographer

John Houston writes:

"There is no photographer's stamp, or marks of any nature on the back of this photograph that I e-mailed to you.   I have other photographs, of myself and with my brother Alan in our Sparta "strips" taken on the same day, and they do not have any stamps or markings on them either.

I seem to recall that they were taken by Mr. Henderson who is 2nd from the left in row 2.   As Mr. Henderson is in this photographs and the photograph taken around 1947, his assistant must have taken these shots.  

The camera used was a plate type, on a tripod, with a large black cloth that the photographer went under to focus, etc.

 I don't think that Mr. Henderson had a photography business.   He was a professional photographer, and I think he worked as such with the Edinburgh Dispatch, or the Evening News.   Mr. Henderson also had a son at Sparta who will be in the photograph, but I can't remember what he looked like."

John Houston:  Dayton, Ohio, USA, May 22, 2006

If you know how to contact Mr Henderson or his family, please e-mail me so that I can discuss the above photograph with him.

Thank you  -  Peter Stubbs

Recollections

2.

Dave McKinlay

New Zealand

Thank you to Dave McKinlay for providing names of some of the people in this photograph, taken in 1949.  I have included these names in the table below.

Dave also added:

Trainers

"The  big guy with the military shirt on the right of the second-back row is Danny Inarellie.  I don't know if I have spelt his name correctly.  He was of Italian parents and had an Ice Cream Cafe opposite Meadowbank in the late-1950s / early-1960s.

The second row in this photo were the Mafia (Committee)."

Trainers

"George and Willie Shaw were brothers.  Both trained us and were very, very  good boxers themselves.  They were well known around the boxing circles in Edinburgh and further afield.

In the late 1950s, I was in Cyprus with the Black Watch.  When I came home I looked George up, and here he was still training kids.

He had  broken away from the Sparta and set up Leith Persevere Boxing club.   I had a couple of seasons with him as a senior, but it was too tough so threw in the towel."

 John Houston:  Dayton, Ohio, USA, May 5, 2006

Sparta Amateur Boxing Club - 1949

1st Row
(front)

2nd Row

3rd Row

4th Row
(back)

Mr. Farquharson

Mr Henderson

James McKinlay

Key
showing colour coding in the table above

Thank you to the following for emailing me and supplying some of the names of the people in this photo.

-  John Houston, Dayton, Ohio, USA

-  Dave McKinlay, New Zealand

-  Margaret Ritchie