Celebrating the first 40 years
How the Heritage Project and the Club are celebrating the first 40 years of the Sheffield Eagles
The Heritage Project is working with the Club to celebrate the 40th anniversary, on 2nd September 2024, with a range of events and activities.
How it began
You can read more about how the Sheffield Eagles started HERE including video of the whole first game including commentary. Did you also know that before the first ever competitive game on 2nd September, where the Eagles beat Rochdale Hornets 29-10, there were three friendly games. You can read about those HERE.
How we are celebrating the 40th anniversary
- Launch - there will be a special photo opportunity that marks the start of the 40th anniversary celebrations, not only will this celebrate the history of the Club but also its future.
- 40 from 40 Years - celebrating 40 players, one from each season.
- Badges - similar to the badge produced for the 25th anniversary of the Challenge Cup last year we'll be producing a badge to mark the 40th anniversary that will be for sale later in the year.
- Heritage Game - this year's heritage game (the home game closest to the first ever game on 2nd September 1984) will be on Sunday 8th September, against Bradford. We'll be organising a series of guests and activities for the day, to be announced closer to the match.
- Celebration dinner - the Heritage Project is supporting the Club in organising a celebration dinner in September to mark the 40th anniversary. This will similar to the Challenge Cup celebration meal with a three course meal, special guests and videos to mark the 40 years.
- 40 years of shirts - we're still in the process of pulling together details of every shirt the Club has ever played in before we photograph them. The photos will then form part of the Heritage Project website as well as being used as a key part of the 40th anniversary celebration.
- Commemorative brochure - we're putting together a 24 page booklet celebrating the 40 years of the Sheffield Eagles. We'll cover the highs and lows, the achievements and the memories.
- Children's booklet - in addition to the commemorative brochure, we're also putting together another special booklet, aimed at children.
- Heritage numbers - we're in the process of producing the final batches of heritage certificates for the men's, women's and wheelchair teams so that we can hand them out to players throughout the season.
Get involved
To mark the 40th anniversary we're producing a 24 page booklet about the Sheffield Eagles. We're still at the early stages of developing it but we're looking to focus on some of the key stories from the last 40 years, share memories, look at the changes to the Club over that time and look forward to the future. Would you like to be involved in putting it together? It could be researching or writing stories. It could be about being part of the steering group to help shape the ideas. It could be about proof reading the final version. It could be just about being part of the process and learning what's involved in producing something like this. We're looking to work with the rugby league journalist Gareth Walker (who we worked with on the Literacy Kicks project) to provide mentoring and advice to people involved, giving you more chances to learn. If you're keen to get involved, have any questions or want to learn more then get in touch.
Share your memories
As part of the 40th anniversary celebrations we're looking for players (past and present) and fans to share their memories. Ideally we'd like to put together a short film, made up of people's memories to share as part of the 40th anniversary celebrations. For the Challenge Cup 25th anniversary celebrations we had some great short clips from players who couldn't make it on the night. We want to build on that this year. So if you're a former player and want to share some memories of your time at the Club then please do so. If you're a fan - it doesn't matter how long for - share with us some of your memories and what the Eagles mean to you. Just send us a couple of minutes of your thoughts and we'll piece it together into a longer video capturing memories. If you don't feel comfortable with video then send us an audio recording / voice note or write something down. Contact details are below.