Harry Langton Collection facts for kids

The Harry Langton Collection is a special group of items about the history of football. It includes many cultural and sports-related pieces. This collection is super important because it forms the main part of two big museums: the National Football Museum in Manchester, England, and the World Rugby Museum at Twickenham Stadium.

Who Was Harry Langton?

Harry Langton (born November 10, 1929, died September 6, 2000) was a sports journalist. He worked for a British newspaper called the Daily Express. In 1972, he decided to retire early. After that, he started his own business in London called Sports Design. This company published and sold sports pictures.

Harry's business was in Islington and near the Camden Passage antique market. This made him interested in buying and selling old sports pictures, paintings, and antiques. At first, there wasn't much interest in football items, even though football was his favorite sport. Over about 20 years, he slowly gathered a huge number of football art pieces and antiques. These items showed the long and worldwide history of the game. He collected items from all kinds of football.

Sharing the Collection

In 1981, an early show of Harry's collection was seen by Sir Stanley Rous. Sir Stanley was the former Secretary of the Football Association. He really liked the collection, which made Harry want to collect even more. He hoped to share it with more people.

The collection started to get attention from other countries too. Some items traveled to Germany for a bank opening in Munich. Other parts were shown as black and white photos in Basel in May 1982. In 1987, after trying many places, Sports Design finally showed 'Football Art – the Langton Collection' at the Wingfield Sporting Gallery in London.

Big Exhibitions

The collection gained serious attention when the Tyne and Wear Museums Service joined with Harry's collection. They created the 'Soccer in Tyne and Wear 1879-1988 Exhibition' in Newcastle. This show ran for two months. Then, it moved to Sunderland in January 1989.

In Sunderland, an Italian promoter saw the collection. He suggested taking it to Italy for the 1990 Football World Cup. The collection was sent to Rome. It was officially opened by Silvio Berlusconi at a place called Spazio Peroni. One of Berlusconi's companies, Gruppo Fininvest, was a main sponsor. Many visitors came to see the collection during the entire World Cup event.

The next year, in 1991, there was the 1991 Rugby World Cup. To celebrate, an exhibition of rugby and old (before soccer) football art was held. This show was at Christie's auction house in South Kensington. Later, the Rugby Football Union bought the rugby-specific items for the World Rugby Museum. In 1994, the entire collection traveled across the Atlantic Ocean for the next World Cup in the USA. An American company, the SPI Group, organized it. The collection was shown at Sotheby's in New York City.

The Collection Finds a Home

Moving and taking care of such a large collection became difficult. So, Harry Langton and the SPI Group agreed to sell it if a good buyer could be found. In 1996, the Langton collection was bought by FIFA and became the FIFA Museum Collection.

With help from the Heritage Lottery Fund and the efforts of Bryan Gray, who was the chairman of Preston North End F.C., the collection became the main part of the National Football Museum. This museum opened in Deepdale Preston in February 2001.

Harry's Lasting Impact

Even after selling the main collection to FIFA, Harry Langton kept buying new items. He worked as a consultant, finding pieces to fill any gaps in the collection. Harry was very involved with the museum in Preston. Sadly, he passed away in September 2000, before the museum officially opened.

In 2006, Harry's wife, Ann Langton (born September 9, 1929, died February 12, 2013), put together a book of poems about football. It was called Saved, A Rare Anthology of Football from Homer to Gazza. This book was launched at the National Football Museum's Hall of Fame Awards in Liverpool.

Later, due to money problems, the National Football Museum moved to the Urbis building in Manchester. It reopened there on July 6, 2012.

After Ann Langton passed away in 2013, Kevin Moore, the Director of the National Football Museum, wrote to her family. He said that "Without Harry, supported by Ann, there would have been no FIFA Collection and therefore no National Football Museum." He added that "both we and the nation as a whole owe them both a great debt of gratitude."

In early 2016, FIFA and the National Football Museum renamed the FIFA Museum Collection. It is now called The FIFA-Langton Collection. This was done to avoid confusion with the new FIFA World Football Museum in Zurich. It also helps to better recognize Harry Langton's important work in collecting football history and art.