IT is with deep regret and sadness that we record the death of Alan Bintley, an Oldham RLFC supporter for more than 70 years.
Pictured with the Challenge Cup, Alan has passed away at the age of 85 after watching and cheering for Roughyeds since 1943.
For more than 30 years he and his daughter Hilary were season-ticket holders.
In a message to club chairman Chris Hamilton, Hilary said that due to her dad’s ill-health they had been unable to get to games for the last 16 months but during that time they had been keeping in touch with the club via the website and closely following games together — as they had done for the previous 30 years as season-ticket holders — on Twitter.
She concluded:
“I hope the club is managing to get through these strange times and I look forward to getting started again.”
The club’s thanks go to Alan for his lifelong support and backing and the sincere condolences of Chris and everyone at the club go to Hilary and the family.
Alan was born to be a Roughyeds fan. His dad before him was a Watersheddings regular and Alan was taken to his first game when he was about eight.
The first time he went out with the girl who was to become his wife, Dorothy, he took her to an Oldham game; not that a trip to watch her hometown team was anything new to Dorothy, who was herself a regular fan, having inherited her interest from her dad.
“Both my grandads were keen supporters so we go back at least three generations,”
said Alan’s daughter Hilary, herself a season-ticket holder with her dad for 30 years.
She added:
“Mum hasn’t been much in recent years. It was always my dad and me. But she has never lost her early interest.
“Dad was in hospital and then in a care home for a few months at the start of last year after first breaking his hip and then having a stroke, but Mum and I went to see him every day and when he was in the care home he always wanted us to take in the many books that have been written about Oldham RLFC and we would spend hours going through them with him page by page. He loved that.”
Because of the pandemic it will be a family-only funeral at Oldham Crematorium on Thursday, but Dorothy and Hilary will arrange a memorial service at Moorhouse Methodists in Milnrow as soon as they are able.
The family have been regulars at Moorhouse Methodists since before they moved to live in Delph in 1976.
