Morecambe

Founded in 1920, Morecambe Football Club rose with the tide of the town’s heyday – when sea air, railways, and potted shrimps brought thousands to Lancashire’s coast. Nicknamed The Shrimps, the club is intrinsically linked to the local delicacy: tiny, pink-brown Morecambe Bay potted shrimps, boiled in sea water, spiced, and packed into pots of clarified butter. A tradition stretching back to Tudor days, and one that found fame in London tea rooms by the 1930s.

It wasn’t just the shrimps. Morecambe Bay’s fishing and cockling industry was a vital lifeline, albeit a dangerous one – the 2004 tragedy that saw 21 Chinese labourers drown in the incoming tide serves as a somber reminder of how brutal these shores can be.

The badge carries the shrimp proudly, alongside two red roses – a nod to Morecambe’s identity as a Lancashire town, and perhaps also to its shared civic story with nearby Lancaster. The roses, symbol of the House of Lancaster, anchor the club to its county.

The town’s growth was fuelled by the Morecambe Harbour and Railway Company, founded in 1846. The railway brought Bradford mill workers to the sea – “Bradford-on-Sea” they called it – and helped shrimp exports flourish. Over time, Poulton-le-Sands, Bare, and Torrisholme merged into one: Morecambe, named (fantastically) after an ancient Greek map describing tidal flats.

In the post-war years, Morecambe was booming. Pontins opened its largest resort here. Miss Great Britain contests filled the seafront. Even the Queen unveiled a statue of its most famous son – Eric Morecambe – born John Eric Bartholomew, the bespectacled half of Britain’s favourite double act.

But fortunes turned. Storms took the piers. Fires closed attractions. And then came Blobbygate – the short-lived World of Crinkley Bottom theme park, centred on Mr Blobby, which collapsed into scandal and cost local taxpayers over £2 million. The rot set in. The glamour faded.

Yet through it all, the football club stood firm. Promoted to the Football League in 2007, and rising to League One by 2021. In that moment, the club hired Two Stories design studio to create a clean new badge – The shrimp remained. The roses stayed. And the club declared itself, once again, as a force for good in north Lancashire.

Morecambe may not have the lights of Blackpool or the wealth of its Premier League neighbours, but its badge tells a tale of community, danger, resilience, humour, and shrimp.

The town is set to have an Eden project of the north built on its shoreline soon. What it needs, what Britain needs, is for its fine and ancient football clubs that embody the spirit of its people - to be kept alive. And to thrive.

105 years of pride.

Let’s save it while we still can.

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