On Thursday October 6, Real Madrid will celebrate their 115th anniversary.
"Impossible!" will no doubt be the reply from those well aware of Los Blancos' official 1902 founding, and on the face of it they appear to be right as the club states that they came into being on March 6, 1902.
But the fact is that something does not tally about Real's founding.
If you go to the club's official website, you will see that on the one hand it says that the club was established in 1902 by Juan Padros, but on the other their first president is specified as Julian Palacios who held the position between 1900 and 1902.
If there was a president in 1900, what happened between that year and 1902?
Three different dates
This exact confusion over dates also appears in the 'Golden Book of Real Madrid" in 1952 to mark the club's supposed 50th anniversary. In it, one of the authors, Manuel Roson tells of how Palacios and others claimed to have founded Los Blancos in 1901.
What happened was that in March 1902, the founders of Real Madrid decided to officially register the institution as a legal entity, with the application accepted a month later in April of the same year.
The meeting of the partners has long been confused with the foundation of the club itself, but as any parent who takes a long time to register the birth of their child will tell you; a child is not born at exactly the same time as one registers it.
Two clubs, one president
In October 1900, the so-called Nueva Sociedad de Fut-ball was founded by Julian Palacios. Nueva Sociedad were not very successful, according to press clippings from the time.
Indeed, they lasted only a year, because in October the following year 1901, the first reference to Madrid Football Club appears.
On October 6, 1901 Real Madrid played their first game, if Madrid-based newspaper La Correspondencia de España is believed.
It wrote: "The Madrid Football Club played its first match at Retiro yesterday, close to the Pigeon Shooting facility."
The fact that both Nueva Sociedad, like Madrid FC, was chaired by Julian Palacios perhaps generated the confusion that they were the same club, though Palacios himself was clear that they were two different clubs, according to Rosón in 'The Golden Book'.
In fact, according to 'Arte y Sport's' March 8 1903 edition, Madrid FC came from the merger of Club Sky and Nueva Sociedad.
It seems clear then, to conclude that Real Madrid were founded in early October 1901 and played their first game on Sunday October 6, with official registration happening in March 1902.
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