Football fans with dementia are to visit a special pop-up museum to celebrate the 150th anniversary of Wrexham FC.
The group includes at least two former Football League stars, one of them Eddie Stewart, who played alongside the legendary Billy Wright in the fabulous Wolves teams of the 1950s.
They usually meet for their 90-minute sessions at Wrexham Football Club’s Racecourse Ground but are planning a special trip to the pop-up museum at the town’s Eagles Meadow Shopping Centre.
The Mold-based group is the first of its kind in Wales and they are even planning to loan some of their treasured items, including a Wrexham Centenary season shirt from 1973 and a large wooden rattle, to the museum.
The museum will be officially opened at 11am on Thursday (May 29) by the Mayor of Wrexham, Cllr Alan Edwards, and former star player and manager Dixie McNeil will be a guest of honour.
The museum will be open from 11am to 4pm every day until Saturday and will include interactive exhibits and free family entertainment such as table football tournaments and treasure hunts.
The club, established in 1864. is the oldest in Wales and the third oldest in the world.
Organisers say the anniversary celebrations are particularly appropriate with the World Club looming because as the Racecourse is the world’s oldest international football ground still in use. The first international match was played there in 1877 when Scotland played Wales.
The group at the Racecourse is run by the Alzheimer’s Society and use football memorabilia, such as old shirts and programmes, to help jog recollections among dementia-sufferers.
Liz Wilks, the Alzheimer’s Society Befriending Manager, runs the group and she said: “The group is made up of up to ten football fans who are living with dementia and we’re looking forward to visiting the museum for one of our regular Friday meetings.
“We find that using football memorabilia often jogs memories of games in the past and in turn that leads to other associations, who you went to the match with and other things that may have happened at that time.
“Football does stir such strong passions and the memories are often very strong, of games and goals, that they can help people with dementia remember other areas of their lives.
“It’s based on a very successful scheme run by Alzheimers Scotland who have over 80 football groups based in Hampden Park, Glasgow, and which is a proven success.
“Our group is the first in Wales and we usually hold the meetings in one of the hospitality suites at The Racecourse and they last 90 minutes and we have tea and biscuits at half-time.
“I believe in Scotland they have served up Bovril and meat pies but we haven’t tried that just yet.”
The Eagles Meadow museum is open between Thursday and Saturday, May 29 and 31, and will feature a whole host of Wrexham FC memorabilia.
There will also be a section about football’s first playboy,Leigh Roose, the son of a Presbyterian minister from Holt, near Wrexham.
Roose, who was killed in the First World War, was an early superstar of the game who was described as “a prince among footballers”.
His star was still in the ascendant when he played in a historic match between Wales and Ireland at the club’s Racecourse Ground April 2, 1906.
It was captured for posterity by the film pioneers, Mitchell and Kenyon, in the first surviving film of an international football game.
A plaque to honour the film was unveiled at the Racecourse on the centenary of the big occasion in 2006 by the then Wales football team manager, John Toshack.
Eagles Meadow manager Kevin Critchley said: “The museum is a terrific idea and we are getting a lot of interest in it and I’m sure it will strike a chord with local football fans.
“We are also very pleased that it may be able to help the Alzheimers group and it’s appropriate that the first football-based dementia group is here in Wrexham which is home to the country’s oldest football club and the world’s oldest international football stadium.”
The Alzheimers group are planning to make their own loans to the museum but are also hoping that it will encourage football fans to root out some of their own long-forgotten mementos and donate them to the Alzheimers Society for the group to use.
Liz added: “One of our volunteers had a Wrexham Centenary shirt which her husband used to do the gardening in but that’s been very popular and the Wrexham Supporters Trust were very excited about it.
“They’ve been very supportive of the group and have helped us but we’re always on the lookout for any football-related memorabilia, it could even be some Subbuteo figures or programmes, anything that could jog memories.”
Anyone able to donate to the group should contact the Alzheimers Society, at Unit 17, Mold Business Park, Wrexham Road, Mold or telephone 01352 700711.For what’s on at Eagles Meadow Shopping Centre go to http://www.eagles-meadow.co.uk/ or https://www.facebook.com/EaglesMeadow
