On 4 May 1904 a group of teenagers in Gelsenkirchen founded a team called Westfalia Schalke. That year gives the "04" in the name of Schalke, which turns 123 years old on 4 May 2027.

Fourteen-year-olds and a ball

According to club tradition, they were boys of 14 and 15, sons of workers, who had just left school. The leader of the group was Willy Gies, an apprentice at a stove factory, and their first pitch was a rough field near a ruined manor house.

Exactly how many there were is not certain, because no founding documents survive: the official website lists eight names, German Wikipedia ten. The team was not admitted to the regional federation and for years played as a "wild" side, until it merged with a gymnastics club in 1912.

From red-yellow to royal blue

Few people know it, but the first colours were red and yellow, which the official website calls "a Holland import". In January 1924 the footballers broke away from the gymnasts and took the name FC Schalke 04.

That is when blue and white arrived, giving the team the nickname Königsblauen, "the Royal Blues". Why these colours were chosen, the sources do not explain.

The miners and the "spinning top"

The other nickname, Die Knappen, is an old German word for miners. Many players and fans worked in Gelsenkirchen's mines, like the legendary Ernst Kuzorra, and the 1928 Glückauf-Kampfbahn ground took its name from the miners' greeting.

After 1919 the Ballmann brothers, who had grown up in England, brought in a game of short, low passes. That is how the Schalker Kreisel, the "Schalke spinning top", was born, with Kuzorra and his brother-in-law Fritz Szepan as its star pupils.

The two were the soul of the great side of the 1930s and retired together in 1949, with a friendly against Atlético Mineiro. By then the club had another name: in 1928 it became FC Gelsenkirchen-Schalke 04, to thank the city that helped build the ground.

Six titles, one UEFA Cup and four minutes

Between 1934 and 1942 Schalke won six German championships, and in 1937 it became the first German team to win the double. The first title came on 24 June 1934 in Berlin, with late goals from Szepan and Kuzorra against Nürnberg. The seventh and so far last title came in 1958, in a final against Hamburg.

The greatest night was 21 May 1997 at San Siro: after a 1-0 win at the Parkstadion, Huub Stevens' "Eurofighters" beat Inter on penalties to lift the UEFA Cup. The last penalty was taken by Marc Wilmots.

In 2001 the club lived the opposite: it was champion for four minutes, until a Bayern stoppage-time goal in Hamburg took the title away. The press called it the "Champion of Hearts", and a few months later the team moved to its current home, the Veltins-Arena.

Its academy produced Manuel Neuer and Mesut Özil, while Klaus Fischer is its Bundesliga record scorer with 182 goals.

Celebrate with us

From a field in Schalke to San Siro, Schalke remains the miners' club, with a heart painted royal blue.

Happy birthday, Königsblaue! Glück auf, for many more years.

See our collectible jerseys at sportarena.gr.

Photo: Veltins-Arena, home of Schalke – Walter Koch, Wikimedia Commons, licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.