Pannell - Brighton Photographers

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 Ebenezer Pannell - Official Photographer for Brighton & Hove Albion Football Club (1905-1914)

Around 1905, Ebenezer Pannell (1860-1934) became the official photographer to Brighton & Hove Albion Football Club. This role had previously been taken by William Avenell, a photographer with a studio at 48 West Street, Brighton. One of the earliest team group photographs of Brighton & Hove Albion F. C. was produced by Ebenezer Pannell in 1905 and later published as a souvenir picture postcard to mark the 1905-1906 football season. Over the next ten years, Ebenezer Pannell published a large number of souvenir picture postcards featuring player portraits and team groups from Brighton & Hove Albion Football Club. From around 1910, Ebenezer Pannell shared his official photographer duties with Brighton & Hove Albion F. C. with George Albert Wiles (born 1877, Hastings, Sussex).

At the end of the 1914-1915 Football Season, the directors of the Brighton & Hove Albion F. C. closed down the football club until the cessation of hostilities. Brighton & Hove Albion F. C. was resurrected in 1919, but Ebenezer Pannell was now approaching retirement and so he left it to George A. Wiles to produce the team group photographs and the player portraits. In 1920, George A. Wiles of Brighton produced a group portrait of the Brighton & Hove Albion Football Team assembled for the 1920-1921 season and photographed a number of the star players, issuing the team photographs and the individual photographic portraits as souvenir picture postcards.

 

Team Photographs

[ABOVE] The Brighton & Hove Albion Football Club Team for the 1905-06 Season, photographed by Ebenezer Pannell of Hove.
BACK ROW : Joseph Clayton (Trainer), Thomas Turner,  H. King,  Frank Scott- Walford (Manager), Mark Mellors, Edwin Clare, Frank Buckley, Richard Kitto (Assistant Trainer)
MIDDLE ROW : Christopher Buckley, Proctor Hall, Richard Joynes, William Yates, Thomas Allsopp,  James Kennedy.
FRONT ROW : Walter Anthony, Arthur Hulme, Albert Fisher
[ABOVE] The Brighton & Hove Albion Football Club Team for the 1910-11 Season, photographed by Ebenezer Pannell of Hove and published by Carter Brothers.
BACK ROW : J. Butt (Assistant Trainer), Thomas Edwin Higham,  J. F. Franklin, Ralph Routledge, Frederick Blackman, William Crinson, Mr John Robson (Manager), Joseph Leeming,   Robert Whiting, Joseph Lumley, George ('Dick') Whittington, S. Weller, R. Helmes (Trainer)
MIDDLE ROW : Joseph McGhie, William Booth, Albert E. Longstaff, James Coleman, W. H. Jones, Charles Webb, William Hastings, John Haworth, Henry Middleton.
FRONT ROW : Edward Elliott, John W. Thomas, William Miller, Thomas Wake

Footballer Portraits

[ABOVE] Portrait of Arthur Hulme, captain of Brighton & Hove Albion F. C. in the 1905-06 Season, photographed by Ebenezer Pannell of Hove. [ABOVE] Portrait of Harry Kent , half-back for Brighton & Hove Albion F. C. in the period 1905 to 1908, photographed by Ebenezer Pannell of Hove around 1905. [ABOVE] Portrait of William Miller, who played for Brighton & Hove Albion F. C. in the period 1910 to 1914, photographed by Ebenezer Pannell of Hove around 1912.

[ABOVE] Portrait of Charlie Webb of Brighton & Hove Albion Football Club,  photographed by Ebenezer Pannell of Hove.

[ABOVE] Portrait of Alfie Tyler who played for Brighton & Hove Albion Football Club in the period 1913-1915, photographed by Ebenezer Pannell of Hove around 1913.

[ABOVE] Portrait of Jimmy Smith of Brighton & Hove Albion Football Club., photographed by Ebenezer Pannell of Hove. Jimmy Smith played for Brighton & Hove Albion F. C. in the 1911-12 Season,

 

Bob Whiting, Brighton & Hove Albion's Goalkeeper (1908-1915)

Photographed by Ebenezer Pannell of Hove

[ABOVE] Bob Whiting (1883-1917), the goalkeeper of Brighton & Hove Albion Football Club, photographed around 1912 by Ebenezer Pannell of Hove. [RIGHT]  Bob Whiting, Brighton & Hove Albion F .C. 's goalkeeper photographed  at the club's ground by Ebenezer Pannell around 1912. Bob Whiting (1883-1917) served as Brighton & Hove Albion's goalkeeper between 1908 and 1915.
Robert Whiting, the first choice goalkeeper for Brighton & Hove Albion Football Club between 1908 and 1915, was born in Canning Town, West Ham, on 6th January 1883. After a short spell in West Ham United reserves, Bob Whiting played in goal for Tunbridge Wells Rangers for a couple of years. Bob Whiting was signed by Chelsea Football Club in April 1906, making over 50 League appearances as their first team goalkeeper.

Twenty-Five year old Bob Whiting joined Brighton & Hove Albion Football Club in the Summer of 1908, making his debut as the team's goalkeeper against Plymouth Argyle F. C. on 12th September 1908.

Bob "Pom Pom" Whiting has been described as "one of the finest goalkeepers ever to stand guard for the Albion". [ Albion A-Z: A Who's Who of Brighton & Hove Albion F. C. by Tim Carder & Roger Harris (1997), page 258]. Bob Whiting made 320 appearances for Brighton & Hove Albion, a record total for an Albion goalkeeper, a record not surpassed until the early 1970s. In the successful 1909-1910 football season, Bob Whiting conceded just 28 goals in 42 matches. He was considered a vital member of the Brighton & Hove Albion first team, wearing the goalkeeper's jersey in every game of the 1909-1910 season which culminated in winning the Southern League Championship title. Bob Whiting was also in goal when Brighton & Hove Albion F. C. defeated Aston Villa, the Football League Champions, to lift the F. A. Charity Shield on Monday 5th September 1910. Whiting kept a clean sheet and Charlie Webb scored the only goal of the match.

Bob Whiting was noted for his punched clearances and long distance kicking. It is reported that "on more than one occasion he drove the ball from his goal area to the opposite square - a matter of a hundred yards". Whiting's kicking power was compared to the force and range of the military Pom Pom Gun, hence his nickname of "Pom Pom".

In 1914, to mark the goalkeeper's 6 years with Brighton & Hove Albion, the club planned a benefit match for Bob Whiting, but this was postponed because of the outbreak of the First World War and Whiting's decision to enlist in the 17th Service Battalion (Footballers' Battalion) of the Middlesex Regiment in January 1915. Bob Whiting, was killed by enemy shellfire on 28th April 1917, while serving on the Western Front.

To read a full account of Bob Whiting's life and career, click on the link below:

Bob Whiting, Goalkeeper of Brighton & Hove Albion Football Club

 
To read an account of the professional photographers who took official pictures of Brighton & Hove Albion Football Club click on the link below:

Professional Photographers and Brighton & Hove Albion Football Club

 

To read a detailed account of Ebenezer Pannell senior's life and photographic career, click on the link below

Ebenezer Pannell - Brighton & Hove Photographer

 

Acknowledgements

I am grateful to David Ticehurst who generously gave me permission to feature the photographs by Ebenezer Pannell which figured in his wonderful collection of Brighton & Hove Albion Football Club picture postcards.

 

 

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