Bethlehem Steel Football Club (1907–1930) was one of the most successful early American

soccer Association football, more commonly known as football or soccer, is a team sport played between two teams of 11 Football player, players who almost exclusively use their feet to propel a Ball (association football), ball around a rectangular f ...

clubs. Known as the Bethlehem Football Club from 1907 until 1915 when it became the Bethlehem Steel Football Club, the team was sponsored by the

Bethlehem Steel The Bethlehem Steel Corporation was an American steelmaking company headquartered in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. Until its closure in 2003, it was one of the world's largest steel-producing and shipbuilding companies. At the height of its success ...

corporation. Bethlehem Steel FC played their home games first at East End Field in

Bethlehem, Pennsylvania Bethlehem is a city in Northampton County, Pennsylvania, Northampton and Lehigh County, Pennsylvania, Lehigh counties in the Lehigh Valley region of eastern Pennsylvania, United States. As of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, Bethle ...

, in the

Lehigh Valley The Lehigh Valley () is a geography, geographic and urban area, metropolitan region formed by the Lehigh River in Lehigh County, Pennsylvania, Lehigh and Northampton County, Pennsylvania, Northampton counties in eastern Pennsylvania. It is a co ...

, then later on the grounds Bethlehem Steel built on Elizabeth Ave named Bethlehem Steel Athletic Field.

History

The first

team in Bethlehem was founded in 1904, according to a June 2, 1925, article in '' The Bethlehem Globe''. The sport took hold of the town and local steel workers formed a recreational team. On November 17, 1907, the Bethlehem Football Club played its first official match, an 11–2 loss to West Hudson A.A., at the time one of the top professional teams in the country. In 1913, the steel company created Bethlehem Steel Athletic Field, the country's first soccer field with stadium-seating. In 1914 Charles Schwab, owner of the Steel Company, took the team professional, using his wealth to induce several top players to move to Bethlehem Steel and changing the team name to the Bethlehem Steel Football Club. Schwab would eventually begin importing players from Scotland and England. From 1911 to 1915, the club was a member of the amateur Allied American Foot Ball Association before moving to the American Soccer League of Philadelphia, another amateur league, for the 1915–1916 season. Bethlehem Steel FC was not associated with a league from 1916 to 1917, playing only exhibition or cup games. In 1917, it joined the professional

National Association Foot Ball League The National Association Football League (also spelled ''National Association Foot Ball League'') (NAFBL) was a semi-professional U.S. association football, soccer league which operated between 1895 and 1898. The league was reconstituted in 1906 ...

. In 1921, several teams from the NAFBL and other regional leagues joined together to form the American Soccer League. Although one of the strongest teams of the time, the owners decided to disband the club, moving the players and management to Philadelphia where it competed as the Philadelphia Field Club. Legendary Scottish football player Alex Jackson, played for Bethlehem Steel. Although Philadelphia won the first ASL championship, the team was in financial trouble and lacked fan support. The ownership moved it back to Bethlehem the following year, and the team restored their initial name. In 1925, the ASL, including Bethlehem Steel F.C., boycotted the

National Challenge Cup The Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup, commonly known as the U.S. Open Cup (USOC), is a knockout cup competition in men's soccer in the United States. It is the country's oldest ongoing national soccer competition. The competition was first held duri ...

. The boycott created some animosity with the United States Football Association. Three years later, in 1928, the ASL again boycotted the Challenge Cup. When Bethlehem Steel chose to ignore the boycott this time, the league expelled them. In 1925 - 1926 Bethlehem Steel F.C. was awarded the United States Football Association Medal. Patrick McColgan, from, Old Kilpatrick, Scotland had travelled to Philadelphia to help establish the team. His name is on the medal. Under the leadership of the USFA, Bethlehem Steel and two other expelled teams joined with teams from the Southern New York State Soccer Association to create the Eastern Soccer League. These actions, part of the 1928–1929 "Soccer Wars", along with the

Great Depression The Great Depression was a severe global economic downturn from 1929 to 1939. The period was characterized by high rates of unemployment and poverty, drastic reductions in industrial production and international trade, and widespread bank and ...

, financially devastated the ASL, ESL and Bethlehem Steel FC. While Bethlehem Steel FC rejoined the ASL in 1929, the team folded after the spring 1930 season.

Year-by-year

;Notes

Honors

Leagues

* Allied American Football Association ** Winner (2): 1912–13, 1913–14 * ALAFC ** Winner (1): 1914–15 * National Association Football League ** Winner (3): 1918–19, 1919–20, 1920–21 ** ''Runner Up (1):'' 1917–18 * American Soccer League ** Winner (1): 1926–27 ** ''Runner Up (3):'' 1922–23, 1923–24, 1924–25 * Eastern Professional Soccer League ** Winner (2): 1928–29,

1929 This year marked the end of a period known in American history as the Roaring Twenties after the Wall Street Crash of 1929 ushered in a worldwide Great Depression. In the Americas, an agreement was brokered to end the Cristero War, a Catholic ...

National cups

** Winner (5):

1915 Events Below, the events of World War I have the "WWI" prefix. January *January – British physicist Sir Joseph Larmor publishes his observations on "The Influence of Local Atmospheric Cooling on Astronomical Refraction". *January 1 * ...

1916 Events Below, the events of the First World War have the "WWI" prefix. January * January 1 – The British Empire, British Royal Army Medical Corps carries out the first successful blood transfusion, using blood that has been stored ...

1918 The ceasefire that effectively ended the World War I, First World War took place on the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month of this year. Also in this year, the Spanish flu pandemic killed 50–100 million people wor ...

1919 Events January * January 1 ** The Czechoslovak Legions occupy much of the self-proclaimed "free city" of Pressburg (later Bratislava), enforcing its incorporation into the new republic of Czechoslovakia. ** HMY ''Iolaire'' sinks off th ...

1926 In Turkey, the year technically contained only 352 days. As Friday, December 18, 1926 ''(Julian Calendar)'' was followed by Saturday, January 1, 1927 '' (Gregorian Calendar)''. 13 days were dropped to make the switch. Turkey thus became the ...

** ''Runner Up (1):''

1917 Events Below, the events of World War I have the "WWI" prefix. January * January 9 – WWI – Battle of Rafa: The last substantial Ottoman Army garrison on the Sinai Peninsula is captured by the Egyptian Expeditionary Force's ...

American Cup The American Football Association Challenge Cup (also known as the American Association Cup or simply American Cup) was the first major U.S. soccer competition open to teams beyond a single league. It was first held in 1884, and organised by t ...

** Winner (6):

1914 This year saw the beginning of what became known as the First World War, after Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria, heir to the Austrian throne was Assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand, assassinated by Serbian nationalist Gavrilo Princip ...

1924 Events January * January 12 – Gopinath Saha shoots Ernest Day, whom he has mistaken for Sir Charles Tegart, the police commissioner of Calcutta, and is arrested soon after. * January 20–January 30, 30 – Kuomintang in Ch ...

** ''Runner Up (1):'' 1920 *

Lewis Cup The Lewis Cup was an American soccer trophy established in 1914 as the championship trophy for the amateur Blue Mountain League, which was composed of clubs from the Lehigh Valley region of northeastern Pennsylvania. It was later awarded to the win ...

** Winner (1): 1928 * Allied Amateur Cup ** Winner (1): 1914 ** ''Runner Up (1):'' 1912

Notable players

* Archie Stark, world record holder for the highest season scoring record with 67 goals in the 1924-25 seasonHighest Season Scoring Records
. rsssf.org

Coaches

*Harry Trend: 1909 *Carpenter: 1913 *Jimmy Lawson: 1914 *William Sheridan: ?–1924 *Jimmy Easton: 1924– *William Sheridan: 1930

References

External links

History of Bethlehem Steel F.C.
by Dan Morrison.
The Rise and Fall of the Bethlehem Steel Football Club
by Julian Brown (archived) {{DEFAULTSORT:Bethlehem Steel F.C. (1907-1930) 1907 establishments in Pennsylvania 1930 disestablishments in Pennsylvania American Soccer League (1921–1933) teams Association football clubs established in 1907 Association football clubs disestablished in 1930 Defunct soccer clubs in Pennsylvania Eastern Professional Soccer League (1928–29) teams National Association Football League teams Soccer clubs in Pennsylvania Sports in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania U.S. Open Cup winners Works soccer clubs in the United States