Football's First Millionaire

Oct 21, 2015, 12:00 AM

John ‘Jack’ Slater, Bolton full-back between 1905 and 1914, would go on to own one of Britain’s largest industrial conglomerates. He survived financial crashes of many millions of pounds and went on to become football's first (and to date only) MP.
In Episode Nine of the Blizzard Podcast we bring you John Harding's story of football's first millionaire from Issue Fourteen. The son of a mill-worker went from signing a £4 a week contract for a provincial club to completing business deals worth hundreds of millions of pounds in today's money, and would go on to rub shoulders in the House of Commons with Aneurin Bevan, Winston Churchill and Anthony Eden.
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John Harding is the PFA's official historian, and writes on a variety of topics ranging from literary and sporting biography to cultural history and criticism.
Issue Fourteen, like all issues of the Blizzard, is available on a pay-what-you-like basis from www.theblizzard.co.uk. Digital downloads cost as little as a 1p each (RRP £3), while print versions are available from £6 + postage (RRP £12). You can also find us on the Kindle and Google Play stores.