O's Through The Ages - A Brief History Of Leyton Orient F.C.
Leyton Orient were founded in 1881 by a cricket club in East London. They named themselves after a shipping company. They have spent most of their existence in the lower reaches of the Football League, winning nothing that anybody outside of E10 would consider significant.
They have also survived two world wars, a string of financial disasters, an Italian owner who appointed eleven managers in three years, and relegation from the Football League after 112 consecutive years of membership.
Orient Through the Ages is a ten-episode series — roughly thirty minutes each — covering the full history of the club from Victorian East London to the present day. Players who went to the Somme and didn't come back. Tommy Johnston, who scored 121 league goals and asked for his ashes to be interred at Brisbane Road.
Laurie Cunningham, who arrived from Archway and was at Real Madrid within five years. The 1978 FA Cup semi-final. A Channel 4 documentary Forbes named one of the five greatest sports films ever made. Justin Edinburgh, who won the National League title and was dead nine days later.
Not the story of a glamour club. The story of a club that has endured — and why that turns out to matter more.
Episodes
Episode 2: They Took the Lead - Clapton Orient, the Footballers' Battalion, and the Cost of War ( 1905–1929))
Episode 1: The Cricketers' Club - From Glyn Road to the Football League (1881–1905)