10 Facts About Harry Stafford

Harry Stafford was an English footballer who played a principal role in the formation of Manchester United Football Club.

Harry Stafford would go on to make over 150 appearances for the Railwaymen and become captain of the Cheshire county team.

Beside his football career, Harry Stafford was a capable athlete who ran various distances from the 100 yards to the half-mile.

Harry Stafford was an exceptional hurdler and represented the Crewe Alexandra Athletic Club for several years until turning professional with Newton Heath disqualified him from competing in amateur athletics.

Davies realised that the Newton Heath skipper was a popular character in North Manchester and in July 1901 Harry Stafford became landlord of one of Davies's establishments, the Bridge Inn, in Ancoats.

On 7 February 1903 Harry Stafford became the first Manchester United player to be sent off, in an FA Cup tie against Liverpool at Bank Street.

Harry Stafford resigned his seat on the board and became landlord of the Imperial Hotel on Manchester's Piccadilly approach; a public house that in December 1907 hosted the birth of the footballers union the AFPU, the forerunner of today's PFA.

In 1917 Harry Stafford moved to Quebec after obtaining the position of boiler inspector at the Montreal Locomotive Works but during the Great Depression lost his job and struggled financially throughout most of the 1930s.

On 24 October 1940, contrary to reports that he had made a fortune as a hotelier, Harry Stafford died penniless at home on Erie Street, Montreal.

Harry Stafford's remains are interred in an unmarked grave in Mount Royal Cemetery, plot number G 733-L.