On New Years' Day no matches were played and on the 5th January only five 3rd Round Cup ties were finished. The big freeze set in with temperatures falling to -20 deg C with huge snow drifts blocking roads and rail. The 3rd Round of the cup was not completed until March 11th.
Pools Companies were at a loss of what to do until January 26th when the first Pools Panel sat. It was made up with Tom Finney, Tommy Lawton, Ted Drake, George Young (all ex-international footballers and managers) and referee Arthur Ellis. To make sure that this was all done sensibly and fairly, the sixth panel member was a Tory MP, John Theodore Cuthbert Moore-Brabazon (the 1st Baron Brabazon of Tara) (YES I AM NOT KIDDING) an aviator, who once strapped a bin with a piglet in it to his plane wing to prove that "pigs fly". Presumably this was the random element in decision-making.
So he was representing the "looney party" by then! The panel sat at the Connaught Rooms in London and appeared live on BBC TV.
11 games were completed on February 16th, 24 on Feb 23rd, the first day that the panel was not required. By March 16th there was a full programme and eventually normality was restored.
Bloomfield Road (Blackpool FC) was hit badly but players did skate on the pitch as part of their daily exercise. Norwich City tried fire to get games on (flame throwers and the like) but this just wrecked the garss and the melted ice refroze. Ironically, their 3rd Round v Blackpool was postponed 11 times with a drawn first tie and then a 1-3 win for Norwich after extra time in the replay.
At the Shay, Halifax Town FC, the club made the best of bad job by opening up the pitch as a public skating rink and although they made a bit of money, the disturbance obviously affected their playing performance and they were relegated from last place in Div 3 to Division 4 along with Carlisle, Brighton and Bradford PA.
Everton won the First Division title that year and Leyton Orient were relegated to Division Two.
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