Our personal Hearts Heros

[Sharpie]

In the statue thread we discuss for whom should a statue be raised, it got me to thinking who were my Hearts heroes and of them who did I meet.

 

My first hero was Bobby Baxter, he opened a newspaper shop in Buccleuch Street at the foot of Gifford Park. My Dad bought his paper there every morning and I sneaked in on the odd occasion. I was confronted by an older man, in a suit and he was nothing like the idol I had worshipped. I then adopted Jimmy Brown, he was awesome then he went to Kilmarnock, and I had to find somebody else. I opted for Tam McKenzie, had to wait a while to meet him, but when in the Polis had reason to go to his shop in the wee street leading to Duddingston Station. A more miserable p----k I have never met, he fell off the list in a hurry.

 

I always liked Freddie Glidden, liked him even more when as a Polis went to the back of the stand at Tynie to parade for duty. The players often congregated there before going in to get ready. As I going around 6' 1" 220lbs in good shape walked down, Freddie looked at the guy he was with and said how would you like to run into that as a centre half every Saturday, made my day and in some respects a life long memory.

 

My other clash with the famous was at the old Palais de Dance. Wednesday night, I am sashaying my girl friend of the time in a quick step, we pass a bunch of Hearts players in their maroon blazers, with a Heart emroidered on the pocket with HMFC, therein. As we make a quick ballroom dancer turn I see Wee Hammy making some comment like "he should get that pumped" we made eye contact both laughesd and he held his hands up in surrender, a magic moment, if ever there was a Hearts legend thats the man.

 

I used to see Bobby Kirk quite a lot around the Drummond Street area, always had a nod or nice word to say nothing but a gentleman

 

I guess of my heroes the closest contact I had was with Billy Duff. I went to school with Billy, and we were quite good friends. When we left school we both worked in the Bruntisfield area, so we used to meet fairly often. I went to the army when I was seventeen so we lost touch for a couple of years. In January 1955, I was on leave from Egypt getting ready to go to London, I had completed over 2/3 of my service. I was taking the short cut through the Caley Station when I met Bill. He was now with Hearts and I told him how lucky he was, to my surprise he told me I was the lucky one, I had got through most of my military service which he still had to do, and I knew where I was going. He said you know this football is not the game we used to play, where I am its a business and you really have no idea where you are going to be tomorrow, fortunately he survived some tomorrows and helped us in a historic Cup win. We lost touch after that for many years, until by the good graces of Bill Duff juniors web page Far From Gorgie we made contact again.

 

Of course when one considers meeting ones heroes, who can forget King William of Bauld. Living in Wester Broome and Clerwood and working Niddrie/Craigmillar the only place to stop for a paper was at The Kings shop in Gorgie Road. Indeed the man was not what you would asume a King to be, he was just a guy in a cardigan selling papers, but if like me you were Hearts daft when he handed you your paper trumpets sounded and lights flashed and choirs sang loud choruses, the saying is the King is dead Long Live The King, but that has not happened and the Messiah is still to cometo Tynecastle.

 

I don't know if all this really means anything, but some of it shows our heroes just put their pants on one leg at a time like us and others really are special

[davemclaren]

I always enjoy your posts Bob. They have the reek of an almost long gone Edinburgh. I recall, as a child, going to matches in the mid 60s with my dad and I can still recall the strong smell of tobacco on the terraces. It's amazing that 'old' Bill thought football was too business like in the 50s. Compared to today they must have been simple times.

[Tazio]

If only players were so accessible now Bob. If you don't hang around expensive bars on George Street you never see them, apart from Tesco that is.

[mac]

Bob, thank you for sharing those memories.

 

My terrible trio are Bowman, Robertson and Mackay:cool:

 

Totally loved these guys, and sadly, never met them.

[Charlie-Brown]

As a kid / teenager my heroes were

 

Drew Busby, Willie Gibson, Derek O'Connor then Sandy Clark, John Colquhoun, Craig Levein, Walter Kidd, Henry Smith & Dave McPherson....after that no more heroes.

[Alan_R]

Showing my age but favourites/players I've liked, not neccesserily great players either, include:

 

Tomaschek, Juanjo, McSwegan, Niemi, Cameron, Flogel, Severin

 

and more recently the likes of Hartley and Gordon.

 

The likes of Bruno and Robbo were well within my lifetime but I was always a bit too young to really understand what was going on/remember clearly.

[TyphoonJambo]

Bob, Great post mate. You mention Bobby Kirk. He's my mums uncle and a name I grew up with as I was reminded that he was a Hearts player, maybe even the reason I became a Hearts fan whilst a little kid. Unfortunately though, family fractions and time have all combined to mean I have never met the man, would love to though and chuffed to hear you thought him a gentelman. For me he biggest hero I had and met was undoubtedly Jim Cruickshank, he came to our school and I scored a penalty against him.

[ArthurScargill]

As a kid / teenager my heroes were

 

Drew Busby, Willie Gibson, Derek O'Connor then Sandy Clark, John Colquhoun, Craig Levein, Walter Kidd, Henry Smith & Dave McPherson....after that no more heroes.

 

Much like yourself, I would say you only really have 'heroes' in the true sense of the word when you are a youngster/teenager.

 

My heroes would be: Robbo (should have got WAY more Scotland Caps), Colquhoun, Mackay and Henry Smith.

 

Other players I have admired, for either ability or character are: Levein, Kidd, Bruno, Clark, Fulton, Rousset, Gordon, Pressley, Skacel, Salvatori, Adam, Naysmith, Neil McCann (First time round), Niemi, Hartley, Fuller, DeVries, Cameron, Flogel and Allan Johnston...

[Drylaw Hearts]

As a kid / teenager my heroes were

 

Drew Busby, Willie Gibson, Derek O'Connor then Sandy Clark, John Colquhoun, Craig Levein, Walter Kidd, Henry Smith & Dave McPherson....after that no more heroes.

 

No Robbo ?

[piltonjambo]

Cruikie

Jim Townsend

Donald Ford

Robbo

[jimbojumbojambo]

First for me as a kid was Chris Shevlane and Willie Wallace then Eddie Thompson and Arthur Mann a few years thereafter. In later years I was fortunate to enjoy a lot of corporate hospitality and met a number of sporting greats such as Best, Law, Charlton, Hansen and our own Dave Mackay, Alex Young, Robbo and Craig Levein from the world of football, Broon frae Troon and Bill Beaumont from rugby and I even golfed with Henry Cooper. Most were decent guys, some were surprisingly shy and one in particular was an arrogant t*sser.

To this day, however, if I am asked to identify a single encounter with a sporting hero I immediately recount the tale of the day King Willie Bauld bought me a pint. I never saw him play but he was my Dad's great hero and I grew up with tales of his prowess on the park and his exemplary behaviour off it.

[Le Chat]

[ronnie_fife]

Saulius Mikoliunas.

[Stupid Sexy Flanders]

Elvis was my hero. He broke my heart.

 

All time favourite player is Robbo, my current one changes all the time, at the moment it's Miko.

[Buffalo Bill]

Henry Smith

Walter Kidd

Brian Whittiker

George Cowie

Craig Levein

Sandy Jardine

Kenny Black

Gary Mackay

Iain Jardine

Neil Berry

John Colquhoun

Sandy Clark

John Robertson

Thank you.

 

 

Buffalo Bill

 

.

[PsychocAndy]

As a teanager I met Drew Busby, Boaby Prentice and Malky Robertson at the Drylaw Hearts PotY at Craigroyston Community Centre, awe struck.

In my mid 20,s I also met Alan Anderson in the Centre Spot and he bought me a pint, and was a real gent.

When I was 30(1994) my missus contacted Hearts and I was invited to the 1st team rooms and met

Sandy Clark manager by then

Robbo

Gary Mackay

Nicky Walker

Fash , who Nicky Walker was ripping the pish out off

Wee John

Fossy, who made me a cuppa

and Gary Locke who was floating about between the 1st team and reseve dressing room.

My sister in law videod this and watching it back I was like a kid waiting to meet the Headmaster on a Monday morning, petrified. The thing is every single one of them was great.