Curator’s Column February 2026

It is really heartening to be able to excuse myself from not having written a column for some time because so much else is going on. The Museum Trust’s decision to mark Ian Holloway’s 1,000 games in management led to a really enjoyable evening for those who attended. Besides this it did many other things:

1. Showed the quality of catering and facilities at the County Ground
2. Led to one of our Trustees, Stephen Mytton, donating a PA System to the Club for the Legends Lounge
3. Put us very much in the good books of the Phoenix Rotary Club in particular and other Rotary Clubs who will hopefully be tempted to use the Club facilities for other events and support Museum events.
4. Helped Ian Holloway get out of the depression caused by being ejected from the Vertu Cup and raised £5,000 for his chosen charity which supports local deaf children.

While none of these is the direct reason for our charitable status, they are putting the Museum in a good light and I am sure will help us towards our goals in the future. A big thank you to all involved in the event, but particularly to our Trustee, Vic Morgan for a great job as MC, to President John, for making the presentation, to Don Rogers for accepting the Bleed Kit the Phoenix Rotary Club has presented to the club and, of course, to Ian Holloway himself, for a fantastic talk and a brilliant job as an auctioneer.

Ian is a man who values his family and I like to think the Former Players Association is making Swindon a family Club while bringing us many items which help preserve the club’s history and will go on to the Museum’s Data base ready for display in due course.

I will just mention one example. A person who lives just a few doors away brought me some football memorabilia relating to his father, Bob Peart. Although he only made a few first team appearances he had a great record in the reserves. “If the Museum has it, it will do more for my father’s memory than in my attic.” How true, and for the Museum and Andy Cossin’s programme archive it has brought in some very hard to come by reserve team programmes as well as Bob’s County Cap. I will never stop stressing the Museum is for all Swindon Town teams, first, second, Youth, male and female. This donation, and the appreciation of it, I hope bares testimony to it.

We have an event planned for March which will tell you far more than I can in this column, so I will close now as I want to write to a daughter of Roy and Les Onslow. The Museum has two of Roy’s scrapbooks which were given to the club, I think by his brother Les, and they are a fascinating read. My own favourite is of how, when Roy made his debut for Swindon at Ipswich, by the time he had got time off from the army where he was doing National Service and paid the train fare he was about a pound out of pocket. I doubt that he cared. A couple of telegrams in the scrapbook from his teammates in Junior clubs show what an honour being able to wear the Swindon Shirt was.