To be honest, I think only a past member of this site can answer this question I have - but from where I am sitting - I get the distinct impression (with various social media releases) that the board of the Carlton Football Club are slowly readying supporters for the clubs' 150 year anniversary celebrations in 2015. This is despite the fact that the club was formed in 1864, and the club's 150th should be celebrated in 2014.

So why are they trying to change history? Every historical book ever printed lists the clubs formation in 1864. Evidence an earlier attempt at forming the club in 1861 has even been found. Academic, author and Carlton historian Lionel Frost must be wondering similar thoughts to me. Why'd he do so much research if the board was going to pull a date out of the air just to suit them.

There's no doubting some important events occurred in 1865 - and if you wanted to get a little bit technical - you could argue that the club wasn't a legal entity until 1865. But we're not reporting to ASIC here. We're talking about events that led to some gentleman meeting and agreeing that a Carlton Football Club should be, and was formed. And these events occurred in 1864.

I'm also mindful of the fact that most supporters wouldn't give two hoots when any 150 year celebrations might be held. But I'd like to think the current administration would honor past administrations. Those same men who saw fit to celebrate our jubilee year in the Premiership year of 1914, our centenary in 1964 and hopefully our 150th year in 2014.

What are your thoughts? (Be mindful that you may own a piece of clothing you bought from the club that has '1864' on it!)

I remember 1964 was our Centenary Year & what a terrible season it was.
The exception being that the ranga from Healsville - Gordon Collis won the Charlie,

2014 is our 150th according to my calculations

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Cheats never prosper (except in the AFL)

This.
Given how much merchandise over the last few years has had 1864 on it, it would be a bit odd to go with 1865.

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Just because some plaque in a pub says "The Carlton football club was founded here at the University Hotel, on 17th May 1865. Ben James was elected as Carlton’s first secretary and James Linacre was invited to be president”?

Linacre wasn't president until 1866 according to official club records.

It's always been 1864. All the records say so. It can't be changed just because someone has mucked up some plaque. We played a season in 1864 for goodness sake.

Maybe they just don't want it to clash with the Glasgow Commonwealth Games

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#DonTheStash

The book(let) for 125 years was put out in 1989 NOT 1990, and also, as you've already said, Lionel Frost has to be considered an expert here, and he says 64.

So, '64 it is and CFC Administration be dammed!!!!

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And you know that it must have been 1864 because 100 years later The Beatles arranged their only australian tour for 1964 to commemorate it!!!

Pity George hadn't written his "For You Blue" then.

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Just so you know, it's public knowledge (raised at AGM) that at Board level, they had (by the end of 2011) discussed the 150th celebrations, and had not decided on which year it should be, in the 150th year or year after.

So that'd be either 2013 or 2014, yeah?

ie 2013 = 150th year of existence and 2014 = 150 complete years of existing.

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Until each team plays each other the same number of times, the AFL, as a fair dinkum competition, cannot be taken seriously.

He (Mr Swann) said the honour and pride associated with the club's traditional navy blue jumper was priceless.

Yeah...similarly to what the AFL did in 1996. (1897)

Another thread doc?

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dane's trolling again

Plans are to celebrate in 2015 as there will be too many other things to celebrate in the two years before.
Premiership merch flying out the door and when that lets up in come the 2015 celebration merch.

This all bothers me very little.

[i][/i]
Is the club really going for 1865?
I know some Carlton people reckon the club was formed in 1865, because there are no match reports from 1864.
Tom Power was an orginal Carlton player and also on the committee/secretary.
He complied and edited the first book on Australian Football called "The Footballer", an annual that ran from 1875-1881.
In all of these editions it states Carlton was formed in 1864.
Why would he make such a glaring mistake? It would have been pointed out by the other clubs, and players and officials at Carlton and changed in the next edition.
At the Carlton annual general meeting in 26 April 1878, it was stated "now the club has arrived at it's 14th. anniversary".
14 years back from April 1878 is April 1864. Why would they make such an obvious error?
Melbourne, Geelong, Albert Park,and the Royal Park clubs would made a fuss if Carlton had falsified the date to 1864, the last two clubs were also formed in 1864.
I could "understand it" if they were trying pull a swifty to be the oldest or the second oldest club and altering the date to 1857 or 1858, but obviously they couldn't get away with it.
Most newspaper reports mention 1864 as the formation year.
However, there are at least 7 reports of the club being formed in 1861, see Blueseum, Pre VFL, Formation of the Club.
Now that is worth investigating.
So maybe the club is celebrating the 154th. year in 2015?

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CFC. EST. JULY 1864: PREMIERS. 1869 1871 1873 1874 1875 1877 1887 1906 1907 1908 1914 1915 1938 1945 1947 1968 1970 1972 1979 1981 1982 1987 1995

1864.

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I don't think anyone is trying to rewrite history but the most compelling evidence for 1864 is that Tom Power said that a decade later, as blueycarlton pointed out. I don't think anyone has found any evidence that we played any games in 1864 so the formation date may relate to the cricket club that shared officials and players with the footy club. But it has always been 1864 so it should stay as that even though it is likely that we didn't play a game until 1865 and the 1865 games are well documented. Actually there wasn't really a proper footy competition in 1864, but it geared up in 1865. Anyway you'd think tradition would dictate that the celebration would be 2014. It is hard to find concrete evidence that we existed in 1864 but equally hard to find evidence that we didn't.

I've still got my Centenary Member's Ticket 1964...........and proud of it!

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No ones listening till you make a mistake.

If the club had any marketing nous (yes, yes, I know......), they'd make it 2014, and market it as the Club's sesquicentenary, and the Club's 150th playing year. That way they have both years covered in one.

How hard was that? Really?

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Well at least we're potentially hiding the fact we'd have gone 20 years without a flag?

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I have a very old Carlton book entitled 'The Carlton Story' which was published in 1958 and it states that the footy club was formed in 1864. It says that the Carlton Cricket Club helped form the Carlton Football Club which was stated in the club's first annual report published in 1865.

Took some photos of the book. Sorry about the quality and I'm not sure how to link imageshack pics anymore.

http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/254/wp000275.jpg/

http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/507/wp000276.jpg/

http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/9/wp000278.jpg/

Well picked up azza.

This secondary source makes it very clear that we played our first game in 1864 - if the primary source is still available then it make it a pretty simple matter to prove it.

Only problem is I think we must have hired Ross Oakley as a consultant on our 150th anniversary celebration project.

I've also got a book written by Tim Hewat in the mid-80s about our history and that also cites 1864 as the date.

I know that the study of history is an always evolving process as new evidence comes to light - however there would need to be something really compelling to change our foundation date from 1864 to 1865.

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