Every great club has an origin story, and Everton's history starts not on a pitch, but in a church hall.
Everton were founded in 1878. The young lads of St Domingo's Methodist church in the Everton district needed something to do once the cricket season finished, so they formed a football team called St Domingo's FC. Their first match was a 1-0 win over Everton Church Club. A winning start. Some things never change.
Word spread fast. Before long, lads from all over the area wanted in, not just the chapel crowd. So in November 1879, at a meeting in the Queen's Head Hotel, the club took the name of the district that had taken it to heart: Everton Football Club. We have carried that name with pride for nearly 150 years, and you can still wear the year it all began on the 1878 St Domingo tee.
From Anfield to Goodison, the move that made us
Here is a bit of history that still raises an eyebrow. From 1884 to 1892, Everton played our home games at Anfield. Yes, that Anfield.
When a dispute over rising rent could not be settled, the club did what Evertonians have always done. We backed ourselves. We packed up and built a new home across Stanley Park, Goodison Park, in 1892, one of the first purpose-built football grounds in the country. The landlord, left with an empty ground, started his own club to fill it. That club was Liverpool FC.
So the next time someone brings up the Merseyside derby, you can tell them how it really began: with Everton having the conviction to walk away and build something better. That instinct is in our DNA.
A founding club, champions of England
Everton are not just old, we are foundational. In 1888 we became one of the twelve founding members of the Football League, and by 1890-91 we were champions of England for the first time. We have spent more seasons in the English top flight than any other club. Everton have always belonged at the top table.
The School of Science and the great Dixie Dean
By the 1920s and 1930s, Everton had earned a nickname that said everything about how we played: the School of Science, a tribute to the club's stylish, methodical football at a time when many sides simply hammered it long.
And then came the man who defined the era. William 'Dixie' Dean remains the most prolific goalscorer the English game has ever seen. In the 1927-28 season he scored 60 league goals in a single campaign, a top-flight record that has stood for almost a hundred years and may never be beaten. He drove Everton to the title that year, and in 1933 he scored as Everton beat Manchester City 3-0 to lift the FA Cup. Wear a piece of that legend with the Dixie 60 tee.
The tower on our badge
Look closely at the Everton crest and you will see a tower. That is Prince Rupert's Tower, better known locally as the Everton Lock-Up, an old village jail built on Everton Brow back in 1787 to hold local troublemakers overnight.
It has featured on the club badge since 1938, when club secretary Theo Kelly designed the crest, and it sits there alongside three of the most famous words in English football: Nil Satis Nisi Optimum, "Nothing but the best is good enough." That motto was not chosen lightly. It is a promise the club made to itself, and it is why the lean seasons sting. We know exactly what this club is capable of.
Catterick, the Holy Trinity and the Golden Vision
The 1960s brought another surge. Under manager Harry Catterick, Everton won the First Division in 1962-63 and lifted the FA Cup in 1966.
Then came one of the finest teams we have ever produced. The 1969-70 title side was driven by a midfield three so good they are still spoken of as the Holy Trinity: Howard Kendall, Colin Harvey and Alan Ball. Ball, a World Cup winner with England in 1966, was the jewel. That side played football of real beauty, and you can salute them with the Holy Trinity tee.
The Kendall glory years
Here is the lovely twist in our story. That young midfielder Howard Kendall, who lifted the title as a player in 1970, came back as manager and gave us the greatest period in the club's history.
In 1984 Everton won the FA Cup. The following season, 1984-85, was simply magnificent: champions of England by 13 points over Liverpool, and winners of the European Cup Winners' Cup, beating Rapid Vienna 3-1 in Rotterdam with Neville Southall, one of the finest goalkeepers Britain has produced, immense between the posts. Two years later, in 1986-87, we were champions again. Mark that European night with the Neville Southall tee.
A roll of honour few can match
Add it all up and Everton's history reads like few others in the English game:
- 9 League titles
- 5 FA Cups
- 1 European Cup Winners' Cup (1985)
Fifteen major honours, won by a club that started in a church hall. The glory days were never a fluke. They were the standard.
A new home, and a new chapter
And now the most exciting part of our story in a generation: a brand new home on the waterfront. The move to the Hill Dickinson Stadium at Bramley-Moore Dock, a stunning 52,000-plus capacity arena on the Mersey, marks the start of a genuinely new era for Everton.
Think about that. A club born in a church hall in 1878, that built its own ground in 1892 when it backed itself, that gave English football its greatest goalscorer and some of its finest teams, now stands in one of the best stadiums in the country, ready to write its next chapter. The foundations have never been stronger. The history has never been richer.
The best days are not behind us. They are being built right now. Wear the year it all started on our best-selling 1878 Stripes tee, and carry nearly 150 years of history with you.
Want more of the heritage? Shop the full range of Everton t-shirts, browse the retro and vintage Everton shirts collection, or own a piece for the wall in our Everton memorabilia and collectables.