[Lord Snooty]

June 8:

On this date in 1942, the Second World War was about half way through. The Battle of Midway had just finished and the Japanese attacks on Sydney Harbour were just starting. And the longest reign for a manager of Huddersfield Town was about to end.

That was Clem Stephenson, who had been manager since May 1929, so just over 13 years. He had of course, been at the club even longer than that, having signed on as a player in August 1920, one of the first signings for Herbert Chapman and just a few weeks after he had played against Town for Aston Villa in the FA Cup Final.

He won the Cup and became a thrice champion as a player, but when Jack Chaplin stepped down as Town manager, Clem was the man to take over, having just hung up his boots at the age of 39.

In his first season as Town boss, he got the team to the FA Cup Final of 1930 against Arsenal at Wembley. He was in charge of the club for the whole of the 1930s and although we didn't win the league again, some club records were set in this decade that still stand today. On the 13th of December 1930, Clem's Town team beat Blackpool 10-1 at Leeds Road with George McLean scoring 4 and Joe Robson 3, with Bob Kelly, Jimmy Smailes and Harry Davies getting the others.

The crowd for this momentous event was only 11,932 which was possibly a reflection of the dark economic times the country was going through. Town finished 5th that season and went one place higher in the next. The following season, we finished 4th as Arsenal took the title. There was the record attendance at Leeds Road this year as we played Arsenal in the Cup with 67,037 turning up to see the Gunners win 1-0.

Arsenal retained the title in 33/34 as Clem led Town to be runners up. We had another slip down to 15th for the next season before rallying once more to finish 3rd in 35/36.

In 1938, Clem led Town to our fifth and, to date, final FA Cup Final. He's the only one involved in all five of our FA Cup Finals, albeit for the opposition in the first one.

He continued as manager when war broke out again and by the time he resigned on this date in 1942 to be replaced by Ted Magner he had taken Town to two FA Cup Finals, finished runners up in the league and were consistently in the top half of the top league throughout his time there. He managed the team in 556 matches, winning 235 of them.

Here's a picture of the 1935/36 squad with Clem the manager on the right side of the front row.