Thomas Swinburne (1933/34 to 1946/47)

Pipe-smoking goalkeeper Tom Swinburne joined Newcastle from local non-league football as a teenager to provide additional cover when Norman Tapken joined Albert McInroy on the injured list.

He made his debut in the following season in a 4-1 home victory over Blackpool. However he only played one more match and didn't make the first team at all during the following two campaigns.

In the final two seasons before the war Swinburne vied with Tapken and Cam Theaker for the keeper's jersey, playing fifty five times in all.

He served in the airforce during the war and in November 1944 he met up with Joe Rogers in the Egyptian desert. He notched up another fifty one games in the unofficial wartime Leagues.

On the resumption of the League he had a new challenger in Eric Garbutt, but due to his rivals injury problems, Tom managed 26 games including all but the first game of the FA Cup run that took them to the semi-final.

Charlie Crowe (In Crowe Amongst the Magpies) described him as "unpredictable, at times making brilliant saves only to fumble a simple shot minutes later".

Charlie also relates how he used to: "pride himself on his judgement at free-kicks. Sometimes when the ball was still in flight he would anticipate that it would clear the crossbar, and would go behind to collect the ball from the crowd".

On at least one occasion his bravado almost misfired; in a game against Burnley at Turf Moor in 1946/47 Charlie recalls that the ball struck the bar and rebounded back into play where it had to be scrambled to safety by his defenders.

United lost the match 0-3 and he only got seven more game before being freed at the end of the season whereupon he joined Consett.

In June 1939 Tom suffered severe cuts about the head and face when he and a friend were involved in a motor accident in which their car hit a telegraph pole.