The History of Edgar Street

Hereford United’s club historian Ron Parrot gives us a brief, and interesting history into the history of the Edgar Street Ground.

The history of the ground is quite an interesting one. It was originally owned by the "Hereford Athletic Ground Co." with United playing there from day one in 1924.

Hereford paid their landlord the princely sum of £82and 2shillings in rent that first season. I have a programme in my own collection for a Grand Cycling and Athletics event staged at Edgar Street on August bank holiday 1922.

Another little known fact is that United players used to change at the Wellington Hotel and had to walk to the ground!

United struggled financially during those early seasons and had to launch several public appeals to stay afloat and their landlords helped out by reducing their rent until by the 1929/30 season they were only paying £14. 7s 0d per year.

However, in June 1931, the City Council bought the Edgar Street ground for £3,000 from the Hereford Athletic Ground Co. and rented it back to United at a much higher rent of £126 per season, reducing each season to £93 at the end of the 1937/38 season just before war broke out.

After the war, the council set the rent at just over £100 until March 1952 when the council granted United a 14-year lease at a "peppercorn" rate of £1 per season.

From 1966 onwards the council set a revised and realistic rate each year until the ignominious events of the early nineties!