John Campbell Orr

John Campbell Orr was an association football player and administrator, who was the most important figure of the promotion of the game in Birmingham in the 1870s.

[5] In 1873, he moved to Birmingham with a business partner, John Carson, who had been a member of the Queen's Park association football club.

[7] On 12 November 1873, the Birmingham Post published a letter from "a clerk" - almost certainly Campbell Orr, in his capacity as secretary to the Calthorpe club[8] - stating: The evangelism worked as from at least 1874 Calthorpe was playing matches against other sides in the town,[10] and, in 1875, after the formation of a dozen clubs in the town, he and Charles Crump of Stafford Road of Wolverhampton pushed to form the Birmingham Football Association.

[18] The Calthorpe club, with strong links with Queen's Park, remained a staunch amateur side, unlike Aston Villa which adopted a hidden professionalism before the 1870s were out.

[24] Campbell Orr's football responsibilities ran alongside his professional life as a director of the firm of J. C. and W. Lord, general merchants based in the Horse Fair in Birmingham.