Early History
QPR was founded in 1886, when a team known as St Jude's (founded 1884) merged with Christchurch Rangers (founded 1882). The resulting team was called Queens Park Rangers, because most of the players came from the Queens Park area of North-West London. QPR became a professional team in 1889 and played their home games in nearly 20 different stadia (a league record), before permanently settling in Loftus Road in 1917 (although the team briefly played at White City between 1931–32 and 1962–63 in the hope of attracting larger crowds).
Queens Park Rangers played on two grounds within Park Royal. The first was the Horse Ring, the site of the now-demolished Guinness Brewery, on the Royal Agricultural Society's show grounds from 1904 to 1907 which had a capacity of 40,000. When the Society sold the grounds in 1907, QPR moved to the Park Royal Ground, 400 yards south, an almost exact replica of Ayresome Park, with a capacity of 60,000. The club were forced to move out in February 1915 as the ground was taken over by the Army.
QPR were promoted as champions of Division 3 South in the 1947–48 season. Dave Mangnall was the manager as Rangers enjoyed 4 seasons in the Second division, being relegated in 1951–52. Tony Ingham was signed from Leeds United and went on to make most ever league appearances for QPR (519).
Prior to the start of the 1959–60 season saw the arrival of arguably the club's greatest ever manager, Alec Stock. The 1960–61 season saw QPR achieve their biggest win to date – 9–2 vs Tranmere Rovers in a Division 3 match. In time, Stock, with the advent as Chairman in the mid-60s of Jim Gregory helped to achieve a total transformation of the club and its surroundings.
Read more about this topic: History Of Queens Park Rangers F.C.
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