About The Project and  How to use the site

Welcome to my website. I have told the story from my own personal diary, now 50 years on ….

The project covers the period of 1965, when I became a Celtic player, until the end of the 1968/69 season when the club achieved its second domestic treble in three years. I have tried to set the scene looking closely, almost 60 years later, at the two consecutive seasons in Celtic’s history – 1965/66 and 1966/67 – which culminated in the club winning the biggest prize in European football.

It should be noted that the touchpaper for that explosive and as yet emulated success is the arrival of Jock Stein as manager – only weeks after my own first stroll under that famous stained-glass window 🙂

But none of that stuff existed in a vacuum either. Other very formidable teams and talented footballers are enmeshed in, and will garnish our story, and of course history in the 60s was being made every day all over the country – not just at Celtic Park or on football fields.

The 1960s was a wonderful decade, in many ways the crucial one which influenced the generation that led us to where we are now.  It was certainly the most important time of my life in professional and personal terms. Those of you who were not around to see it unfold will I hope get a sense of how our sport, our country, our politics and our culture were changed forever in that short space of time. It is certainly my intention to help you do just that.

No historical record of Celtic Football Club can rest merely on one period of time. I, and others have written extensively on the origins of Celtic, but for context, I felt it important to provide a brief history of those origins and its evolution.

How to view the site

Clicking on Celtic: The Pre Stein Years (see main menu)will provide access to a potted history of Celtic up to 1965. Clicking here will take you to chronological list of events, starting with the earliest.

Clicking on ‘Memoirs’ section (see main menu) will reveal links to;

• A list of my memories from the years 1965-1969: Jim Craig’s Memoir 1965, Jim Craig’s Memoir 1966, Jim Craig’s Memoir 1967, Jim Craig’s Memoir 1968, Jim Craig’s Memoir 1969.
  Click on any of these to get to the desired calendar year with links to Jim’s memories of for every Celtic match played, and some of the contemporaneous social and cultural shifts in Scottish and world society society
• Another list of some random memories and recollections as well as Celtic Curiosities in the Random Memories pages,

Hope you enjoy the journey – but it is your journey as well as mine. Please feel free to add your own reminiscences and thoughts as we go along.

Jim Craig