This article first appeared in the Arsenal magazine in 2005, written by Andy Exley.
When Arsenal host their first fixture at Emirates Stadium in the summer of 2006, it will be exactly 80 years since Sir Samuel Hill-Wood first became chairman of the Gunners.
The Hill-Wood family had moved down from Derbyshire (where they had run former First Division club Glossop North End) in 1919 and immediately became involved in the Gunners (‘because they were the best football team in the south’, according to Peter Hill-Wood).
Samuel Hill-Wood’s tenure as chairman was followed – after a spell with Sir Robert Bracewell Smith at the helm – by his son Denis in 1962 and after two decades service, the baton was passed to his son Peter, who is now in his 23rd season at the helm.