Youth and Early Career
Although Stark and his brother Tommy Stark were born in Scotland, they moved to the United States with when Archie was thirteen years old. His family settled in Hudson County, New Jersey where Stark immediately began his organized soccer career with the West Hudson Juniors. Interestingly for a player who made his name as a forward, Stark began as a defender with the Juniors. Stark turned professional a year later when he signed with the Scottish-Americans of the National Association Football League for the 1912-1913 season. At the time he was only fourteen. He remained with the Scottish-Americans for four seasons. In 1915, the Scottish-Americans won the 1915 American Cup, defeating Brooklyn Celtic 1-0 on a Stark goal. The next season, the team lost the AFA championship game when Bethlehem Steel crushed them 3-0. At the end of the 1915-1916 season, Stark moved to the Bayonne, New Jersey club Babcock and Wilcox.
However, World War I intervened and Stark joined the U.S. Army in 1917, briefly interrupting his career. Stark served in France.
Read more about this topic: Archie Stark
Famous quotes containing the words youth, early and/or career:
“And my youth comes back to me.
And a verse of a Lapland song
Is haunting my memory still:
“A boy’s will is the wind’s will,
And the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts.””
—Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1809–1882)
“Women who marry early are often overly enamored of the kind of man who looks great in wedding pictures and passes the maid of honor his telephone number.”
—Anna Quindlen (b. 1952)
“A black boxer’s career is the perfect metaphor for the career of a black male. Every day is like being in the gym, sparring with impersonal opponents as one faces the rudeness and hostility that a black male must confront in the United States, where he is the object of both fear and fascination.”
—Ishmael Reed (b. 1938)