In the Clitheroe Times of 16th October, 1891 the birth of the Ribblesdale League was briefly announced.

By Alan West

At a meeting of cricket club secretaries held al the Dog Inn, Whalley last Tuesday , it was decided to form a new cricket league to he entitled The Ribblesdale Cricket League, to consist of the following clubs Padiham, Clitheroe, Whalley, Settle, Burnley St Andrews, Read, Barrow and Barnoldswick. Mr A Aspin of Padiham was appointed Secretary and Treasurer and a sub-committee was entrusted to draw up Rules. Probably one or two other clubs will be included.

For thirty years or more before that clubs in the Ribble Valley and Pendle area had sprung up and developed regular fixtures between themselves and sometimes at what were in those days formidable distances. Whalley's fixtures in the years before the league was formed included matches at Ordsall Hall in Salford, at Wigan and Huyton and even at the Western Club in Glasgow and in the Isle of Man. Most village teams employed professionals well before the leagues were dreamt of.

One of the reasons for the growing popularity of cricket had been the touring professional teams, notably the All‑England X1. One such team played a three‑day match at Whalley on 8‑10 June, 1865 against XXII of' Whalley. No W.G. Grace present this time to fire the imagination but well‑known Yorkshire and Nottinghamshire players, including R.C. Tinley the demon lob bowler who made his presence felt by taking 29 of the 42 Whalley wickets to fall. The year before, in 1864, Whalley C.C. had been represented at the historic meeting at the Queen's Hotel in Manchester which formed the Lancashire County Club, inevitably by a member of the Green family. And the first county match to be played away from Old Trafford was the first ever Roses Match ‑ at Whalley in 1867. Remarkably the original score book for the mid 1860 survives intact and has recently been loaned to the Old Trafford Museum.

Indeed a whole book could be written in itself about those formative years based solely on the expansive records of' the Rev. Sam Norwood, headmaster of' Whalley Grammar School and from 1871 secretary and treasurer of Whalley C.C. His manner can be imagined from his writing style and it is no surprise that within a few years he had fulfilled his ambition of taking the club out of debt and squeezing every last subscription out of the members, some of whom he clearly regarded as of no more worth than the resident roller‑pulling donkey. "The club has sustained a loss by the death of its donkey which owing to an accident had to be destroyed. The animal was a good servant ‑ somewhat slow ‑ did its work without my remarks thereby setting an example to many other asses.‑ The replacement proved too lively and a year later comes another sad and biting report. "The donkey difficulty is not yet solved. The fiery ass, whose astounding exertions astonished every beholder last season, has passed into a world where even asses are at rest, and at present we are without a donkey of the four‑footed variety." By the Annual General Meeting of' 1877 all is well. "The donkey difficulty which threatened at one time to be as tangled and intricate as the 'Eastern Question' is now settled and I am glad to be able to report that we have an ass of' remarkable sagacity and vigour and in every way worthy of' the Whalley Cricket Club." They don't write minutes like that anymore!

The collection of' Subscriptions, incidentally was achieved not simply by persuasion, and evidently sarcasm, but by legal threats. The minute’s record letters of February, 1875 to Mr. Levi Fish and Mr. Nathaniel Fish of Church Lane, warning them that if their Subscriptions of 10/6 be not paid before 10 o'clock of Saturday, March l3th the cases will be entered in the County Court without further notice. As their names do not appear on the register of' members for the following year, one presumes that they were not impressed. The list of members numbered 95 that year which compares favourably with today. The fight to gather in subscriptions was obviously a constant one; the Clitheroe Times of 22nd July, 1898 refers to the suing of William Harrison by Mr. Nathan Aldersley, secretary of' Clitheroe C.C. for non‑payment of subscriptions. "The defendant pleaded infancy but we should think he is rather a big infant. The case was non‑suited.

Precisely why the early 1890s saw the sudden emergence of cricket leagues all over Lancashire is difficult to say. The first had come in 1888 ‑ the Bolton Association. The Lancashire League (previously the North East Lancashire League founded in 1890), the North Lancashire League and the Central Lancashire League all started the same year as the Ribblesdale League in 1892. The Football League, of course, had set a trend in season 1888‑89 with its heart in Lancashire. Perhaps the question is why, with professionals and regular friendlies and local derbies, the leagues were not formed earlier. It was not entirely the desire for winning of prizes and medals: when the buying and awarding of medals was discussed at the first Ribblesdale League AGM in the autumn of 1892, voices were raised against the idea. It might spoil the cricket!