Keke's St. Andrew's Stadium

The Blues had played at three grounds before the St Andrew's site was purchased in October 1905. The club had been playing at Muntz Street for 29 years, about a mile away down the Coventry Road. You can go there today, but there is no evidence of the old ground. It once stood next to the present day location of Somerville school and a road runs though the original site.

The clay pit in Small Heath

This early print shows the St. Andrew's site before construction.The land was a clay pit covering a natural well, and the natural rise of the land can be clearly seen. The terraced houses on Tilton Road are in the distance, the old Coventry Road to the right, and the railway is in the foreground.

St.Andrew's. 26 December 1906

This picture postcard purports to show St. Andrew's on the opening day of the stadium. It shows a ground suspiciously complete, with wooden crush barriers and a neat fence surrounding the playing area.

The ground was designed by a carpenter, called Harry Pumfrey. He was the brother of a former Blues full back, Bernard Pumfrey, who played at left back 13 times for the club. The Pumfreys were a well-to-do family, who owned land in the city, as well as their carpentry business.

In the 1920's, a series of picture postcards of the players of the day were issued. The players stood proudly in front of the Main Stand, surrounded by its white picket fence. The terracing and wooden crush barriers are clearly visible. There were 19 terraced steps, accomodating 5,000 and the 29 rows of seats held 6,000 spectators. This one shows James Daws, a right half who played 46 times for the Blues between 1920 and 1924. It is signed "Yours sincerely, Jim Daws, 1921"
	Main Stand 1921
	This grainy newspaper photo shows the smoking wreckage of the old Main Stand. It burned down one January evening in 1942, after the wartime Auxiliary Fire Service doused a minor fire with a bucket full of petrol!
Main Stand 1942

St.Andrew's in 1946

The ground took 20 direct hits from Luftwaffe bombs during the war, perhaps they didn't like our defensive formation. In 1942, first the Main Stand, then the Railway End burned down. After a spell playing at Villa Park, redevelopment started with a new roof for the Kop. Here it is before the corrugated iron cladding was added.

It used to be said that in the days of steam trains, the smoke from a passing train would billow over the low roof of the Railway End and obscure the goal! This photo, taken on 6th October 1979, shows a train approaching St. Andrew's.

St.Andrew's in the early 1950's

The low height of the old Railway End is clearly visible. The Kop, the only one in the country down the side of the ground, looks formidable. To the right, the temporary post-war cover of the old stand, later rebuilt as the Main Stand, can be seen at a height below that of the terracing at the Tilton End. The photo was taken from part of the Tilton terrace that fell into disuse, as the side panel of the Main Stand obscured the view.

St. Andrew's in 1955

A full St Andrew's was always a wonderful sight. The record attendance is variously recorded as 67,341, vs. Everton in February 1929, or 66,844 for a 5th round FA Cup game, also against Everton on 11 February 1939, although when the ground was originally laid out, it had a potential capacity of 75,000.

Although there had been a small roof built to cover the back of the Tilton Road in 1938, by the 1950's, the crowd at the Tilton End were left uncovered. In one sense, the stadium looked better than it did in later years. The sweep of the Tilton, with its two wings, looks magnificent. A new Tilton roof was finally built in the 1960's, funded by the club's success in Inter Cities Fairs Cup.

The Railway End stand

The Railway End was a low terrace covered with a shallow roof. It reflected the shape of the larger Tilton Road End at the east side of the ground by having two corner wings, set at an angle.

One of these corner terraces, at the St Andrew's Street approach, on the Main Stand side, survived until 1998. It was used for the police in the 1970's and for handicapped people from the 1980's.