Scotsman Obituaries: Colin Brown, women’s football club founder and independent councillor

Colin Brown was one of the most influential figures in Scottish women's football

Colin Andrew Webster Brown BEM, councillor and women’s football club founder. Born: 10 July 1944 in Forfar, Angus. Died: 13 April 2024 in Forfar, aged 79

A transatlantic New Year phone call paved the way for Colin Brown to become one of the most influential figures in Scottish women’s football. It came from fellow Angus man Al Bell, who wanted to set up a school exchange between his birthplace of Brechin and his new home in Farmington, Connecticut.

He was put in touch with Colin, who came from nearby Forfar, and when the pair spoke at the turn of 1979 it set the wheels in motion for a remarkable success story.

Already a passionate youth worker, Colin agreed to help and the programme was soon under way.

One early result was his founding of girls’ side Forfar Farmington FC which, under his management, would go on to win the Scottish Women’s Football League Cup (SWFL).

Meanwhile Colin combined his football role with public service, becoming an independent councillor and depute provost of Angus Council. Such was his enthusiasm for his home town and community he was known as Mr Forfar.

The son of grocer Charles Brown and his wife Alison, he grew up in the Angus county town, attending Craigie Primary and Forfar North Schools, then Forfar Academy. On leaving school he had a variety of jobs, including at textile manufacturing firm Don & Low and transport company BRS.

When he became a day centre officer at Forfar’s Lilybank Resource Centre it marked the start of more than 25 years supporting people with learning disabilities.

Throughout that quarter of a century he was held in great esteem by generations of users and their families, and it was this post that sparked his involvement with the World Special Olympic Games, seeing him travel with local teams to competitions in places including Athens and America.

Over the years Colin held numerous roles at the Special Olympics, notably becoming Scotland’s head football coach.

His interest in football stretched back to his childhood and he played with a Young Farmers’ team before setting up Forfar Youth Club in the late 1960s and running its men’s amateur football team.

He also managed various other football teams, including new team Kirrie United in Kirriemuir, while still actively involved in the youth club. By 1977 his youth work was recognised with the award of the Queen’s Silver Jubilee Medal services to young people.

That phone call from Al Bell came a couple of years later, and in 1980 the first party of Americans arrived in Scotland, bringing with them a girls’ football team and resulting in the first informal girls’ team being formed in Forfar.

The following year Colin took a party of local boys to Farmington but it wasn’t until 1984 that Forfar Farmington began playing competitively as a squad, initially in friendly matches, before joining a formal league in 1990.

Many successes followed, including formation of the club’s first youth sides in 2002. Then, in 2005, its senior side won the SWFL Cup and was promoted to the Scottish Women’s Premier League for the first time.

Today the club is unrecognisable from those early days, having expanded hugely at grass roots level with the women’s team, 18s National Academy Programmes, youth teams and juniors, including an Under-9 programme. Along with league and cup successes at youth levels, the club’s women’s side won promotion to the SWFL Division 1 in 2011.

But from those roots in the USA emerged something far more than just a football team: it was a community that supported hundreds of youngsters over the years, the link with Connecticut resulting in numerous weddings in the USA between young people from Farmington and Forfar.

And it turned Colin into something of a legend in women’s football. In addition to serving as founding chairman and president of Forfar Farmington, he sat on the board ot the Scottish Football Association as Scottish Women’s Football representative, and was garlanded with awards for his service.

They included a Citizen of the Year award in 1993 for services to young people and the community of Forfar and Angus Sports Awards for Coach of the Year in 2002, Team of the Year in 2005 and Service to Sport in 2008. In 2006 Celtic and Liverpool star Kenny Dalglish presented him with the SFA and Sunday Mail award for the Best Volunteer in Grassroots Football Scotland.

While hugely dedicated to Forfar Farmington, he was also fully engaged over the years either in his career or, in retirement, as an Independent councillor in local government when, as in everything he did, his aim was to make a difference for the people of Forfar.

He served Angus Council for more than 15 years, including as depute provost in 2017.

In 2019, in recognition of his lifetime commitment to the community, he received the British Empire Medal and was invited to the Queen’s Garden Party for a third time.

He is survived by his wife Jan, whom he married in 1969, daughters Gillian, Alison and Nicola, seven grandchjldren and three great grandchildren.

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