Carlisle City Council will hold a Special Council meeting on Monday 8 October to grant the Freedom of the City of Carlisle to football legend Ivor Broadis.
Ivan Arthur ‘Ivor’ Broadis (born 18 December 1922) is a former professional footballer who, following his retirement from the profession, has lived and worked as a football journalist for many years in Carlisle. During the Second World War he completed 500 flying hours on RAF Wellington and Lancaster planes (as a navigator he helped return hundreds of troops home to Britain).
Ivor guested for Tottenham Hotspur and other teams during the war years. After the war he was posted to RAF Crosby-on-Eden and when Carlisle United heard how close he was, despite him being aged just 23, they offered him the player/managers job in August 1946. Ivor remains the youngest man to ever have been a player/manager in the English Football League. Bill Shankly said, “Ivor Broadis was one of the strongest and most dangerous inside forwards that ever played”. Ivor played professionally for Carlisle United, Sunderland, Manchester City, Newcastle United and Queen of the South. Ivor gained 14 caps for England, scoring eight goals for the National Team, including two in the 1954 World Cup finals.
Following his retirement from playing and coaching, Ivor spent many years in Newcastle and then Carlisle reporting on football, becoming a much-respected local journalist, covering particularly Carlisle United and, latterly, Gretna.
The Special Council meeting will be held in the Civic Centre’s Council Chamber at 2pm. Ivor will be admitted as an Honorary Freeman of the City of Carlisle, ‘being a person of distinction that has also, in the opinion of the Authority, rendered eminent services to our area’. He will be presented with a casket containing a formal written address.
