Our search for 100 Objects that define Watford football club continues. As you may know the objects can be historic and relate to an important on pitch moment, or be related to a fans personal relation ship with the club. This weeks object is one such personal object. We had an email from Tim Turner. Tim writes a blog called “Albert McClenaghan’s Throw In (And other stories)“ and was inspired by our challenge and has done a run down of all the Watford memorabilia he has collected over the years. You can read his full list of Watford memorabilia here.
After his first email I asked Tim is there was one particular item he wanted to put in. This was his reply.

If I had to nominate one item for your list, it would a coffee mug that must be nearly 40 years old. It still gets used regularly – maintaining the link between the 11-year-old boy who got it as a present years before I ever tasted coffee or tea, and the 48-year-old me, still watching the same team at the same ground drinking out of the same mug. Alternatively, as a symbol of the futility of football merchandise, I give you the ashtray. It’s quite a smart one, as it happens, made of some sort of brushed metal. But, unlike the mug, it’s never been used, since I don’t smoke and never have. Presumably my mother was struggling to find something to buy me for Christmas in the club shop and this was all she could come up with. All the best Tim Turner

We have wanted to put a Watford mug into the list and Tim’s mug seems the perfect one to put in. You can see how loved it is from the chip on the rim and the slightly faded paint work. I had contemplated putting in my Dad’s unused Watford mug. I say unused because he had a theory that whenever he didn’t drink out of it Watford won. He never drank out of it and Watford lost, drew and won many, many games. It lived on the top of a kitchen unit in our old house. I have no idea where it is and I hope we didn’t forget about it when we moved out.


We still have a LONG way to go in our list. So if you fancy having a look through your own collections then you may find an object that means a lot to you that you want to put in the Watford in 100 Objects list. Please Email any of your ideas you have to podcast@fromtherookeryend.com

Oh, and here is the ashtray Tim’s mum got him for Christmas as a child. Back then the Hornet shop couldn’t of had the selection of child friendly merchandise it has today.




Jon

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