Rangers Football Club - The Origin Story

Rangers Football Club, based in Glasgow, Scotland, was founded in March 1872.

One day, four teenage boys walked through West End Park [known today as Kelvingrove Park] and discussed how they might form their very own football club. Soon thereafter, the fourth-oldest club in Scotland was born, and played its first match against Callander [since defunct] two months later.

The four founders of the club were the brothers Peter and Moses McNeil, William McBeath, and Peter Campbell. They were joined by David Hill—who played for the club, and Scotland, as a winger—as a founding member. Moses McNeil would go on to become the first international footballer to play for Rangers FC when he represented Scotland in a match against Wales in 1876.

In 1891, at the end of the inaugural season of the Scottish Football League, Rangers were crowned Joint Champions with Dumbarton. Four [4] successive titles would follow at the turn of the century, from 1899 to 1902, when they overtook Celtic, who had won four [4] of their own in the intervening years.

Full List of Rangers FC Honors

Scottish League Championship: 55

Scottish Cup: 34

Scottish League Cup: 28

Scottish Challenge Cup: 01

European Cup Winners’ Cup: 01

Thus began one of the greatest rivalries in football—local to Glasgow but loud enough to resonate around the world. The Old Firm, a collective name for the two clubs, has since defined Scottish football: Rangers have won the league title a record 55 times while Celtic won their 54th in the 2023-24 season.

The first Old Firm derby ever played was on 28th May 1888, which Celtic won 5-2.  

Rangers FC were one of the six founding members of the Glasgow Football Association in 1883, and one of ten original members of the Scottish Football League in 1890. They were also the first club in world football to win fifty [50] national league titles, and have won the second-most amount of trophies behind only Al-Ahly, the Egyptian club.