03/04/2022
KRO (KEEP RIGHT ON)
A little bit of History with links to my Birmingham, Arbroath (where i have lived for 14 years) and KRO (Birmingham City FC) background
Keep Right On is one of the most well-known anthems in football, famously sung by Birmingham City fans.
It has become such a big deal at Blues, fans even adopted the phrase as their motto and sign off their tweets with the hashtag ' '.
We take a look at the origins of the song and when it came into the terraces at Birmingham City.
Where does the song come from?
The song originally came from Scotland. The song was written and sung by Sir Harry Lauder, a singer and a comedian. Lauder was very popular during the early 1900’s and he achieved international success. The song was adopted by Birmingham City FC Fans in 1956
Sir Harry Lauder lived from 4 August 1870 to 26 February 1950. He was a highly successful Scottish singer and entertainer who toured the world for four decades, and was described by Sir Winston Churchill as "Scotland's greatest ever ambassador". The wider picture in Scotland at the time is set out in our Historical Timeline.
Harry was born Henry McLennan Lauder at his maternal grandfather's house at 4 Bridge Street, Portobello, Edinburgh on 4 August 1870. He was the eldest son of John Currie Lauder and Isabella Urquhart MacLeod McLennan. His father was a skilled potter and both his father and mother came from fairly well-off and well connected families.
In 1882 Harry's father moved with his wife and six children to a new life near Chesterfield in Derbyshire where he had been employed to design china. Shortly afterwards he contracted pneumonia and died. Isabella and her - by now - seven children moved back to Scotland to live with her family in Arbroath. Harry helped support the family by taking evening work at a nearby flax mill, after studying in the mill school during the day. Two years later his mother moved in with her brother's family in Hamilton, Lanarkshire, and the three oldest boys, including Harry, became coal miners.
