A bit of a puzzler

posted by John Winn

Amongst my cricket memorabilia is a small autograph book in which I collected almost exclusively cricketers' signatures at the Scarborough Festivals of 1955 and 56. In addition there are these two pages, one of Yorkshire players' signatures and the other Warwickshire. These were not collected by me but by a friend of my dad's and I had always thought that they were collected at a game between the two sides at Middlesbrough. Two clues suggest this must have been in 1958, one being the presence of Ronnie Burnet who captained the side in 58 and 59 along with that of Johnny Wardle who was dismissed by Yorkshire in the middle of the 58 season. The only trouble with that theory is that the two sides met at Harrogate, not Acklam Park, that year and Burnet did not play although I suppose as skipper he might have been present at the ground. The Yorkshire XI was Stott, Taylor, Lowson, Close, Wilson, Padgett, Trueman, Wardle, Binks, Appleyard and Pickles. Of these 8 can be clearly identified but I can not identify the signature to the left of Padgett's and I think the one under Illingworth is Sutcliffe.

The Warwickshire page does not help for there are approaching 20 signatures, and it seems unlikely that they would not bring that many to an away match.Their team was Gardner, Horner, Leach, Spooner, Fletcher, Hitchcock, Ibadullah, Leadbeater, Carter, Altham and Thompson.  If we look to the return match it was played in late August when Wardle had gone and the Yorkshire XI included Bird, Sharpe, Bolus, Wilson and Ryan who did not play at Harrogate. Watson, and Trueman were on test match duty at The Oval v New Zealand.

In my detective work I had always assumed that they were collected at the same match but am beginning to think that this may not have been the case. Nevertheless the book is  treasured possession and if I say that Evans, Tyson, Appleyard, Dexter, Bailey, May, Bedser, Miller, Benaud, Davidson, Adcock and McGlew are among many others I collected in person then you will know why I have kept the book for over sixty years.