Gamper, Joan

Hans-Max Camper (his mother’s maiden name Hessig ( German Hässig ) is periodically quoted in Spanish sources) was born in Winterthur , Switzerland . He was the eldest son and the third of five children born to Camper Sr. and Rosina Emma Hessig. His mother died of tuberculosis when he was eight years old, and the grieving family moved to Zurich . At an early age, Camper was known as an ardent cyclist and runner. Throughout his life he was a lover of all sports. In addition to football, he played rugby, tennis and golf. However, in Switzerland, he became famous as a football player and the permanent captain of the Basel club. In 1897 he happened to work in France ; in Lyon, he played for a rugby club.

In 1898, Camper gathered in Africa to develop a sugar trading business, but on the way decided to visit his uncle Emily Geissert, who lives in Barcelona, and fell in love with the Spanish city, deciding to stay in it forever. He later changed his name to his Catalan version, Joan Gamper . He began to work as an accountant in a large railway company and write sports articles for two Swiss newspapers. He joined the local evangelical Swiss church and began playing football in the local Protestant community in the Sarria Sant Gervasi area . Gumper also helped publish Los Deportes magazine .

October 22, 1899, Gumper posted an ad in the weekly Los Deportes announcing his desire to create a football club .

Swiss, British and Spanish football fans responded to the announcement, expressing a desire to become founders: Walter Wilde, Luis Osso, Bartolomeu Terradas, Otto Kunzl, Otto Mayer, Enrico Ducal, Pere Cabot, Carles Pujol, Josep Lobet and his new friends John and William Parmes . That is how the story of the great football club Barcelona began.

On November 29 of that year, in the Gimnasio Solé sports hall, elections were held for the president (Walter Wilde), secretary (Luis Osso), treasurer (Bartolomeu Terradas) and captain (Joan Gamper). At the same time, due to the large number of Britons, the club received the name Football Club Barcelona (original English version) instead of the Spanish name Club de Futbol Barcelona .

Although Gumper was the driving force in the club, he initially chose the role of board member and club captain. Probably the fact is that he was only 22 years old, and he just wanted to completely surrender to the game he loved. He played 48 matches for Barcelona between 1899 and 1903, scoring more than 100 goals. His teammate was the Englishman Arthur Vitti. In 1901, the team won their first trophy - the Macaya Cup , later renamed the Catalan Championship. During the rally, Barcelona defeated Franco Espanyol with a score of 13-0, while Gamper scored 9 goals in that meeting. A little later, on May 13 of the following year, the first ever in the history of El Clasico between Barcelona and Madrid , won by Barcelona 3-1.

In 1902, the club participated in the very first draw of the Spanish Football Cup, having been defeated 2-1 by the “Bizkaia Club” (later renamed “ Athletic Bilbao ”).

In 1908, Joan Gamper became the first president of FC Barcelona. He took over the chairmanship as the club was on the verge of collapse. Some of the club’s best players hung their boots on a nail and were unable to find a replacement. Soon, this began to influence the club's behavior on and off the field. The club has not won anything since 1905 and as a result financial problems began. It was in 1905 that Gumper decided to take control of the situation and nominated for the presidential election. It was then that he uttered words that became a symbol of the revival of the club:

Joan Gamper became president of the club five times (1908-09, 1910-13, 1917-19, 1921-23 and 1924-25) and spent a total of 25 years at the helm of Barcelona.

One of his biggest accomplishments is helping Barcelona acquire its own stadium. Until 1909, the team played in various fields, but not one of them was the property of the club. Gumper managed to attract funds from local companies and on March 14, 1909 they moved to the Career Industry stadium with a capacity of 6,000 people. He also continued the campaign to attract new club members, and by 1922 there were more than 10,000 people in the club. This allowed the club to move to the Les Corts stadium. Initially, its capacity was 20,000 seats, but later it was significantly expanded to 60,000 seats.

Gumper also took in the team of the legendary player Paulino Alcantara and the club constantly became the first in goals scored, and in 1917, Jack Greenwell was appointed manager. This qualitatively improved the team’s game.

During the Hamper era, Barcelona won the Catalan Championship eleven times, took six Spanish Cups and four Pyrenees Cups. Thanks to Greenwell's talent, besides Alcantara, Sagibarba , Ricardo Zamora , Josep Samitier , Felix Sesumaga and Franz Platko proved themselves in that team.

On June 24, 1925, the dictator Primo de Rivera accused Hamper of promoting Catalan nationalism, with the result that Les Corts Stadium was closed for three months for booing the Spanish anthem and greeting the British anthem. After these events, Joan Gamper lost his former enthusiasm and his health deteriorated sharply.

After some time, the country's authorities still allowed him to return back to Barcelona, ​​but under certain conditions:

Joan Gamper shot himself dead on July 30, 1930.

He was buried in the Montjuic cemetery ( Cat. Cementiri de Montjuïc ) in Barcelona.

In 1955, the management of FC Barcelona proposed to name the Camp Nou under construction in honor of Joan Hamper, but Franco’s dictatorship abruptly stopped this attempt. Club historian Manuel Thomas identifies the following reasons:

Later, the city appeared to them. J. Gamper in the area of ​​Les Corts, and the club forever secured membership card number 1 to his name.

In 1966, President Enric Liaudet organized the Joan Hamper Cup , which in recent years has gained a significant international reputation, and which traditionally opens the season at Camp Nou. In August 2004, Barcelona entered the Guinness Book of Records, deploying the world's largest banner (the flag of Catalonia) in the Hamper Cup (Italian Milan was an opponent). The striped cloth made of fireproof fabric measuring 13,108 m² broke the previous record - 12,000.

On June 1, 2006, the Barcelona leadership inaugurated the sports complex Siutat Esportiva Joan Gamper in Sant Joan Despí.

Also one of the main features of FC Barcelona is its versatility, which is manifested in the existence of many different sections, exactly what Gamper intended it to be.

• 1 Cup of Makaya 1901-1902
• 1 Barcelona Cup 1902-1903

• Rodes i Català, Agustí (2001) (in Catalan). Joan Gamper, una vida entregada al FC Barcelona. Barcelona: Ediciones Joica. pp. 270. ISBN 978-84-931884-5-0 .
• Gamper Soriano, Emma (2008) (in Catalan). De Hans Gamper a Joan Gamper: una biografía emocional. Editorial El Clavell. pp. 252. ISBN 978-84-89841-48-2 .

• Hamper Profile
• A man from Ticino. Joan Gamper.