ABSTRACT
The split in Everton Football Club in 1892 was a defining moment in the history of Merseyside football. Our knowledge of this event has been advanced by a handful of studies, which, though not concentrating specifically on the split, have helped to establish an orthodox view of the dynamics that lay behind it. 1 Essentially, the split is portrayed in those accounts as a critical point reached in the financial relationship between the Everton membership and their president and landlord, John Houlding, over the issue of the club's financial obligations to Houlding. The president stands accused in historical accounts of abusing his position within the club in order to impose a series of arbitrary rental increases on the Everton membership from the late 1880s, and to extract high interest rates for loans made to the club for ground improvements. The split of Everton in March 1892 is understood as the outcome of Houlding's financial exploitation of the club.
