Real Cobblers
This is where the name comes from. Northampton was the world capital of shoemaking and everyone in the town walked around in diamond-encrusted golf shoes, or something. I really should have paid more attention on the trip to the Boot and Shoe Museum (yes, there is one). Here we see some football boots being made, probably so the Cobbs could give someone like Peterborough a damn good thrashing.
We were famous once...
Mainly thanks to this chap, Dave Bowen, who was Cobblers boss when we had our one glorious season of top flight football (that's the old First Division to you) in 1965-66. After a brave effort to stay up, we soon headed back down the divisions. I'm told if our transfer bid for Alex Stepney had come off it may have all been different. I've got a few programmes from that year and it seems they had a lot of injuries too...
They're going up...
It's not all football though, why there's the brilliant Northampton Balloon festival, where everyone mills around for a while, watching them light up the big air holders until they announce it's too windy to send them up. Cracking stuff.
