Legend that Jack built

Debts of £63,688 had proved crippling. The board didn't know which way to turn. They had run out of ideas - apart from one. It was a decision that was definite, and final, and would put an end to all of their problems.

But it would also bring an end to the life of one of the Football League's founder members and make the name of Accrington Stanley famous for all the wrong reasons.

Jack Barrett remembers it all too vividly, which is why, as the club stands on the brink of an historic return to their Promised Land, he is proud to be labelled the man who breathed life into the reformation of the Reds.

"It was like there had been a big funeral when we went out of the League," said the 81-year-old, who still follows Stanley home and away. Even on a bitterly cold Friday night at Gravesend he is as enthusiastic as ever. "Nobody in the town wanted to talk to each other - at work or at play - because there was only one thing they could talk about. The football.

Even though it is almost 44 years on from that fateful day in 1962, he tells the story as if it was yesterday. And there is still a hint of anger in his voice as he explains how £10,000 was handed to the club to buy them time but was swiftly and cruelly rejected by the Football League just a day after their resignation had been tendered.

It wasn't too little, but it was too late.

"I think something had already been arranged for when a vacancy came up because Oxford United came straight into the League," Jack said.

Competitive football continued in the town until 1965, when the club's reserve side resigned from the Lancashire Combination.

For two and a half years Jack felt there was a void in the town that could only be filled by football. He wasn't alone, which is why he couldn't understand the general apathy towards getting the club reformed.

Numerous attempts had been made to get the club back on its feet. But they had been half-hearted, and failed.

When Jack read a notice in the Lancashire Evening Telegraph on Monday, October 6, 1968, stating that there would be a meeting in Accrington's public library for those who wanted to help reform Accrington Stanley, he sensed it was the last chance saloon and felt compelled to find out why previous attempts had fallen well before the first hurdle.

He had been a fan of the original Stanley side and longed for football to return to the community. But when he counted the number of bums on seats that night, it was clear to him why there had been such a long absence.

"Accrington wanted a football team and there were only 25 people there," he said. "It was disgraceful.

"And half of those were people who didn't want football and it was an opportunity for them to say it would never start up.

"I shot up to my feet. I didn't know what was going to come out of my mouth, but I had to say something.

"I told them I didn't know whether I was more surprised or more disgusted at what had gone on. We were there to reform a team and nobody had done anything about it.

"So I proposed that we selected a committee that night."

Jack recalls how a broad grin spread across the face of one of the meeting's organisers Dick Briggs.

At last, someone was making progress.

"People asked how we would start without any money or a ground," Jack continued.

"I told them we would start where every other club in the land started - at the bottom, and work up.

"I said if we reformed that night we would have a ground the day after, because the town would be more or less obliged to do it, and that there were a million ways of raising money.

"But we could only do one of two things - win or lose - and at that moment we were doing nothing.

"I said We are taking a chance. If we lose, we've lost nothing, but if we win, we gain everything'."

Jack got the backing he had hoped for, the appointment of manager Jimmy Hinksman followed, then trials were advertised to find a new batch of players and later held at Bullough Park. Hinksman was very particular about the kind of squad he wanted to assemble, and Jack saw first hand the boss's brutal honesty when it came to telling the players who hadn't made the grade.

Fundraising was also top of the prioirty list, and Jack volunteered for a 100-mile solo sponsored walk from Accrington to Liverpool and back in May 1969.

As a postman, pounding the streets was second nature, which is just as well because he added an extra 20 miles to his journey after getting lost.

It took the then 45-year-old just over four days to complete the trek after being waved off from the Town Hall and having breakfast laid out for him in the Lancashire Evening Telegraph canteen.

He had hoped to raise around £200, but there had been a lack of organisation by certain club officials and, although he refuses to name the culprit, he admits his efforts were only rewarded with "peanuts", but added that he would do it all again for the good of the club.

The Stanley show went on, and few people were more proud than Jack when the reformed club kicked off their first match, at their new Crown Ground, against Formby Town on August 15, 1970.

Goals from John Nuttall and Alan Davies got life back in the Lancashire Combination League off to a successful start in front of a crowd of 620.

And under the guidance of Hinksman, they went from strength to strength.

Fast forward 35 years, and Jack can see parallels between the first Accrington Stanley (1968) manager and present day boss John Coleman.

"Jimmy provided good football and that's how it continued," he said.

"John eats and sleeps football, and it was the same with Jimmy.

"I've been with this lot for 38 years now but I never thought I would see the day when we were on the verge of regaining our Football League status.

"It could take teams 100 years to do something like this."

But Jack, who served Stanley as secretary for 10 years and is now Honorary vice president, has been deeply impressed by the winning squad which Coleman has assembled.

And the man who spoke up for Stanley has everything crossed that he will witness their remarkable return.