Foundation and expansion trophy - they would end the season as Scottish champions Third Lanark started as the football team of the Third Lanarkshire Rifle Volunteers (3rd LRV), part of the
Volunteer Force. The team was formally founded on 12 December 1872 at a meeting of the Third Lanarkshire Rifle Volunteers in the Regimental Orderly Room in Howard Street, Glasgow. The soldiers, inspired by the
first ever international friendly which had taken place two weeks previously, decided to form their own team. Several of the Scotland team in that match, made up solely of
Queen's Park players, had been part of the regiment: including Billy Dickson,
Billy MacKinnon and
Joseph Taylor. and at the first AGM in March 1873, the constitution was amended to allow members of Queen's Park to become office bearers of Thirds. The players first used an old
drill field on Victoria Road (north of the village of
Strathbungo, close to today's Govanhill Park, roughly on the site of
Hutcheson's Grammar School's Primary department), to train. The club soon moved a short distance to a new ground,
Cathkin Park situated at the junction of Allison Street and Hollybrook Street. the club was a founder member of the
Scottish Football League in
1890. By then, Third Lanark had already won the
Scottish Cup in
1889, having fallen at the final in
1876 and
1878. The name was changed to Third Lanark AC in 1903, when official links with the military were severed. In the same year, the club moved to
the second Hampden Park which had been vacated and deconstructed by Queen's Park who themselves had relocated to
a new third Hampden. Third Lanark had to play much of the
1903–04 at this new Hampden while their own ground, renamed New Cathkin Park, was rebuilt for their use. Despite this upheaval, they won their only
Scottish League championship in that season, as well as the Scottish Cup again in
1905 Indeed, only four of the players were actually registered with Third Lanark. During the tour they played 25 matches, winning 24 and drawing the other game. including a game against the
Argentina national side on 24 June. They dropped out of the top division for the first time in 1925 and spent a period as a 'yo-yo club', with three relegations and three promotions in total over the next decade. As well as consolidating in Division One until the interruption of World War II, the club also reached another Scottish Cup Final in
1936, going down 1–0 to Rangers. After being relegated in 1953, Third Lanark beat Rangers 1–0 to lift the Glasgow Charity Cup in 1954, and captured the same trophy two years later against
Partick Thistle, then returned to the top tier in 1957. After losing to
Hearts in the
1959 Scottish League Cup Final, the last day of the 1960–61 season saw the club reach a historic landmark. Third Lanark beat Hibernian 6–1 at Cathkin Park to reach 100 goals for the season, and the win secured third place in Scotland's top division. The following season saw
Thirds take part in European competition for the only time when the club faced
Rouen of France home and away in the
Anglo-Franco-Scottish Friendship Cup (Rouen won 4–0 at Cathkin on 7 November 1961 and 2–1 in France on 9 May 1962). Third Lanark won its final senior trophy, the Glasgow Cup, on 8 April 1963, beating
Celtic 2–1 in the final at Hampden Park. Third Lanark fielded one of the only
Scottish Jewish professional footballer players,
Sam Latter. Third Lanark had a notable following among the Jewish community in Glasgow, many of whom lived nearby. It was reported by the
Jewish Chronicle that as late as 1960, around one-quarter of match-going fans were Jewish. When the club folded, many Jewish supporters of Third Lanark opted to begin supporting Celtic, despite most within the broader Glasgow Jewish community supporting Old Firm rivals Rangers.
Decline Only four years after that successful 1960–61 season, the club's decline began. The 1965–66 season found Thirds in Division Two, having been relegated as a consequence of the club's most unsuccessful season ever, with only three wins and a single draw from 34 matches in the league in
1964–65 (the final 21 fixtures were all lost). There followed another two seasons of mediocrity and discontent. On 8 January 1966, the
Glasgow Herald announced in a front-page story that the board was investigating the possibility of moving Third Lanark to the new town of
East Kilbride and selling Cathkin Park for housing.
That season, Third Lanark played 36 league matches, winning 12, drawing 8 and losing the other 16, thus gaining 32 points to finish fourteenth out of nineteen clubs. 55 goals were scored and 65 conceded. Third Lanark recorded its lowest-ever home League attendance of 297 spectators on Saturday 15 April 1967 (on the same day as the
England-Scotland international at Wembley) for the visit of
Clydebank. Third Lanark won 1–0 with a goal from forward John Kinnaird; it would be the team's final competitive victory. The last Third Lanark home game against
Queen of the South on Tuesday 25 April 1967 ended in a 3–3 draw; Brian McMurdo scored twice for Queens in the second half, including the last goal in senior football at Cathkin Park (the Thirds goals came from John Kinnaird (2) and Hugh McLaughlan; they were 3–1 up at half time). The final attendance at the ground was given as 325 spectators. The final Thirds game was a humiliating defeat at
Boghead Park About a fortnight after the final match at Boghead Park, it was announced that Glasgow Corporation had received an offer from the Third Lanark board to sell it the land at Cathkin for housing. The club's board acknowledged that a lack of funds had made this move inevitable. Around the same time, the board also announced that it was negotiating with an estate company to build a new stadium at
Bishopbriggs, to the north of Glasgow. In the end, the stadium was never built. A subsequent
Board of Trade investigation into Third Lanark's affairs - which was published in November 1968 - revealed constant player squabbles and bitter internal struggles for power, as well as the fact that the corruption at Cathkin extended to defrauding the club lottery (which rarely paid out the weekly £200 prize). It was also disclosed that players were paid late and often in coins rather than notes, they had to make their own way to away matches, hot water was not available after matches and every appointment in the club's management was made personally by club chairman Bill Hiddleston. This may have been a disincentive for anyone who was not close to Hiddleston to remain working for, or remain as a shareholder of, the club. All of these events finally took their toll; on 7 June 1967, Lord Fraser in the
Court of Session in Edinburgh issued a winding-up order and appointed an official liquidator. The petition to wind up the club had been brought by a Glasgow building company which claimed that the club owed it more than £2000 for work done on the new stand at Cathkin Park. The judge accepted figures submitted on behalf of the provisional liquidator which showed that the club's liabilities exceeded its liquid assets by £40,000 in preference to those presented by the club and, with no sign of that position changing any time soon, he was left with no alternative but to issue an order to wind up the club. On 26 June 1967, it was announced that Third Lanark's membership of the Scottish Football League had ceased and that the club's remaining players were up for transfer. On 1 July 1968, four former directors of Third Lanark were found guilty of contravening the
Companies Act 1948 by failing to keep proper books of account during the two years preceding the liquidation of Third Lanark, and fined £100 each. The investigation by the Board of Trade accused club chairman Bill Hiddleston of blatant corruption and found that "the circumstances (merited) police inquiry". Hiddleston had died of a heart attack in
Blackpool on 16 November 1967. The role of chairman Hiddleston in the club's liquidation was, and remains, the subject of debate among those close to Third Lanark. He may have wished to profit personally from the sale of Cathkin Park for property development. Cathkin Park was sold for housing during the 1967 close season, but Glasgow City Council refused planning permission. On the other hand, he built a new grandstand for the club in 1963, an unlikely thing to do if Hiddleston had intended to put the club out of business. Another allegation was that Hiddelston wanted to force the club to move to either
Cumbernauld or
East Kilbride, the then booming
New towns in the Glasgow commuter belt, which at that time had no senior sides of their own.
After liquidation After Third Lanark went into liquidation, some Third Lanark fans began supporting other local clubs such as
Queen's Park or
Clyde, and others began supporting the
Old Firm. The nearby Junior club
Pollok also received many new fans. Although most other Scottish teams that went into liquidation were later reformed as amateur sides, there was no such resurrection for Third Lanark for many years. It has been suggested that this was because there was such a prolonged period of downfall for Third Lanark that many fans felt too tired of what had gone on at the club to try to bring it back. A youth team later adopted the name "Third Lanark Athletic" (playing at Rosebank Park), as did a ladies' team. Occasionally exhibition matches were staged at Cathkin with a scratch Third Lanark team. Former Glasgow MP
Sir Teddy Taylor bought the company name "Third Lanark Athletic Club Ltd" from the sequestrators in 1967, when there remained the possibility of the club continuing in another form.
Rebirth as an amateur side Third Lanark returned to its now dilapidated Cathkin Park home, playing in the Greater Glasgow Amateur League. On 9 June 2008, a four-man delegation from the club made a surprise announcement to the press, stating that Third Lanark AC would be interested in returning to the Scottish Football League, after SPL team
Gretna decided to withdraw from the SFL. The other contenders for the vacant league place were
Spartans,
Cove Rangers,
Annan Athletic,
Preston Athletic and
Edinburgh City. However, there was no formal application from Third Lanark to enter the SFL, and the club remained in Division 3 of the Greater Glasgow Amateur League. The vacant senior League place finally went to Annan Athletic. In recent times, there have been moves towards reviving the senior club. Third Lanark A.F.C. is an amateur team who, as of the
2018–19 season, play in the
Central Scottish Amateur Football League. The team previously competed in the West of Scotland AFL and the Greater Glasgow Premier AFL. As of 2018, the team is playing its home games at the
Toryglen Regional Football Centre (a modern facility a short distance from Cathkin Park) and at the Barlia Football Centre in Glasgow's
Castlemilk district, having played at Fullarton Park (home of
Vale of Clyde F.C.), in prior seasons. ==Nickname==