The Red Devils Through The Ages - A Brief History of Manchester Utd
There is a statue outside Old Trafford of three men: George Best, Denis Law, and Bobby Charlton. The Holy Trinity, as Manchester supporters call them. It is a good statue. But it does not tell you about the railway workers who founded the club in 1878 and played in green and gold on a patch of ground near the depot. It does not tell you about Major, the St Bernard dog who wandered from a fundraising bazaar into the home of a Manchester brewer — and whose journey saved the club from bankruptcy and set in motion the chain of events that produced the name Manchester United. It does not tell you about the 23 people who died at Munich-Riem Airport on 6 February 1958, or about Matt Busby receiving the Last Rites twice and coming back to build a team that won the European Cup ten years later. It does not tell you about the 26 years of Alex Ferguson — the most sustained period of dominance in the history of English football — or about the twelve years since his retirement, with their parade of managers and broken promises and the deepening question of what Manchester United actually is, now that the man who defined it for a generation is gone.
Manchester United Through the Ages tells the complete story: ten episodes, thirty minutes each, covering every era from Newton Heath to the present day. Each episode places the club in its historical context — the city, the country, the era — and chooses one player whose story illuminates the period. This is not a highlights package. It is a narrative — careful, specific, emotionally honest about both the triumphs and the failures. For supporters who lived through these years and for anyone who has ever wondered what it is about this particular club, in this particular city, that has made it what it is. Come on, United.
The Red Devils Through The Ages - A Brief History of Manchester Utd
Latest Episodes
Episode 5 : The Babes Two Titles, Europe, and the Runway at Munich (1953–1958)
They were, for a few short years, the most beautiful football team England had ever produced. Discovered by Joe Armstrong on schoolboy pitches from Dudley to Belfast, coached by Jimmy Murphy on the training ground at The Cliff, and unleashed by...
Episode 4 : The Busby Era Begins Carey, the 1948 Cup Final, and the End of the Wilderness Duration (1945–1952)
In October 1945, Matt Busby walked into a football club that had no home, no money, and no manager. He walked out of it, seven years later, with the FA Cup and the League Championship — and the first great Manchester United side of t...
Episode 3 : The Long Wilderness - Relegations, Rescue, and the Bombing of Old Trafford Duration (1922–1945)
The first golden era is over. Ernest Mangnall is gone. Sandy Turnbull lies in an unmarked field in France. And Manchester United, relegated in 1922, are about to spend twenty-three years finding out what it means to be a great club t...
Episode 2: The Red Devils Are Born - Ernest Mangnall, Old Trafford, and the First Golden Age (1902–1922)
A new name does not automatically produce a new club. But a new manager, sometimes, does. Ernest Mangnall arrived at Manchester United in 1903 and proceeded to build the first great team in the club's history: a side that won the First Division...
Episode 1: The Heathens - Railway Men, Green and Gold, and the Dog That Saved the Club (1878–1902)
There's a story that almost no one knows, and it goes like this: in 1901, a Saint Bernard dog named Major escaped from a fundraising bazaar at St James's Hall in Manchester. He wandered across the city, ended up at the home of a wealthy brewer ...