THE asset-stripped status of York Rugby League Club has turned full circle over 130 years.

The club started out in 1868 with little money and no permanent home, their only assets a pair of portable goal posts which were transported from pitch to pitch on a cart.

A little over 130 years later, York have a permanent home of sorts, but the assets cupboard is largely bare following the move to Huntington Stadium.

The leading club in York prior to 1868 was that associated with St Peter's School, and their founder, Robert Christison, was instrumental in the formation of what is now York RL. He called a meeting at a house near Knavesmire with the intention of forming a York Football Club, and a club by the name of York Amateurs was formed.

The team enjoyed a nomadic existence in the pre-Clarence Street years - with their portable posts in tow - until a permanent pitch was secured on Knavesmire opposite the current grandstand.

One of the first captains was Herbert Severne, an Old Peterite, and the scorer of the club's first try was Christison himself. However, even at that early stage, York and success did not go hand in hand. It took three years for the club to record their first victory - and that was in a soccer match against York Training College.

Results picked up in the mid 1870s as the club attracted a higher standard of player, notably Charlie Wood, regarded as the leading half-back of his time. Wood, who signed from St Peter's in 1876, made his debut against top side Kirkstall and went on to score six tries in a game against Bradford.

The following year York were among several leading Yorkshire clubs who, determined to raise the profile of the game and the standard of play, inaugurated the Yorkshire Rugby Union Challenge Cup. In the first season 16 teams battled it out for the T'owd Tin Pot, with York eventually losing out to Halifax in the final.

The York team, which lost by one goal and one try in the final on December 29, 1877, was: H Harris, H Maughan, G Milner, W E Christison, C Wood, A Christison, L Glaisby (captain), W R Nicholson, W J McKenzie, J Jolly, R H Christison, E Smith, M Wilkinson, R D Elves, W Milner.

Financial problems in the early 1880s forced the club out of the Yorkshire Gentlemen's Ground in Wigginton Road and in 1883 the club amalgamated with York Melbourne Club.

After playing on Poad's Fields for a short time, the York Lunatic Asylum leased the club a plot of land at the end of the Clarence Street in 1885.

The club committee felt it was high time the club established a permanent home and the historic first game at the new site was between a York XV and 20 players from the city.

A threat to the club's tenure at Clarence Street arose when the lease came up for renewal in the late 1880s.

The local vicar and residents opposed the renewal, but a club spokesman asked objectors to attend a match to judge for themselves, rather than "standing off and condemning unseen a popular pastime because of their ill-founded prejudice".

The lease was granted at the "enormous" sum of £50.

The club made great strides with the team of 1895, which won virtually all their home matches. Off the field the club paid £85 for the Waterman's Mission Hut in Fishergate and converted it into their first grandstand, incorporating dressing rooms.

There were also changes on a wider scale as northern teams broke away from the Rugby Football Union to form their own Northern Union.

York resisted the initial clamour to switch but, as the better clubs began to join the new order, it became a financial necessity to follow suit.

The decision to join the Northern Union was taken at a meeting at the Bar Hotel, Micklegate, on Monday, April 25, 1898 and five days later they played their first match under NU rules against Hull KR.

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