This first clue was this card, and there were actually two links to our theme with it.
The first was the date of issue, 1908, which was also the date of "The Old Age Pensions Act 1908", and that gave certain residents of the United Kingdom their first ever State Pension. This was means-tested, with your recent expenditure being examined, and in addition you had to be aged over seventy, be earning below £21 a year, be sober, and of good character, and have been living in this country for over twenty years. If you could fulfil all those clauses, a single person would receive five shillings a week, and a married couple, from which the husband was aged over seventy, would receive seven shillings and sixpence.
The second link to our card was the team, for Everton is reported to have the best pension scheme of all the football clubs, though the truth is that they were actually the only club to fill out the recent government survey which posed the question.
Our man is John Daniel Taylor, and he was born in Dumbarton on January the 27th, 1872, , joining the local football team. We know that he was the best goal scorer for them, and that he also scored Dumbarton`s first ever league goal in 1890. He also played for Scotland between 1890 and 1898.
He then moved to St. Mirren in 1894, and then to Everton, in 1895 or 1906, records vary. Whilst he was at Everton he played in three F.A. Cup Finals, those of 1897, 1906, and 1907 (all held at Crystal Palace). However only the middle one was an Everton win.
In 1910 a freak accident ended his professional career. What happened was that during the F.A. Cup semi-final, he was struck in the throat by the ball, and his voice box was irreparably damaged. He did continue playing, but was demoted to an amateur team, South Liverpool F.C.. They were actually promoted to the First Division of the Lancashire Combination Division in 1913, only to almost immediately see play cancelled for the duration of the First World War. And they did resume play again after the war, but closed down in 1921.
I have not been able to find any reference of our man playing after the war, but we know he did not die until February the 21st, 1949.
The Trading Card Database/JDT cites eighteen cards for him, and agrees that it appears that his "rookie" card is from this time, being Singleton & Cole`s 1905 untitled set of footballers, which does not give us a word of biography, for it only has a list of the company`s brands and prices. The front, however, names him as "J. Taylor. Everton".
It is also whilst at Everton that we get his first biographical back, on Cohen Weenen`s "Football Captains 1907-8". That reads "J. TAYLOR, EVERTON. (Half-back). One of the finest players in England and a deadly shot at goal" It also tells us that the photo used for the card was taken by R. Scott & Co. Manchester. The Cohen Weenen card is his only other picture in colour, but it shows him with brown hair, whilst our card has a distinctly copper hue
Our card is the only one to give any personal information, that being his height, of "5 ft 10 in."
There is not much of a description for this set in our original reference book to Ogden`s issues (RB.15, issued in 1949), just :
- 78. 50 Famous Footballers. Fronts lithographed in colour. Backs in dark blue, with descriptive text. Home issue 1908.
And in our original World Tobacco Issues Index it is further reduced to :
- FAMOUS FOOTBALLERS. Sm. Nd. (50) ... O/2-99
This identical text appears in our updated World Tobacco Issues Index, but with a new card-code, of O100-422