Bayview Park Icons: The Directors’ Box

The summer of 1971 saw the building of an iconic part of the stadium, the stand alone Directors Box.

Construction of Bayview Park’s iconic directors’ box (July 1971)

With East Fife now being a First Division side the directors decided to make full use of the space above the dressing rooms by building the box in order to provide “first class amenities for visiting directors”. This they did. The stairs from the new directors box led to the inner workings of East Fife hospitality and day to day running, incorporating the boardroom, guest room, kitchen and toilets.

It was a strange structure that stood out from the rest of the ground and kind of gave a “them and us” message to the support. Having sat in it once, it did create a really strange atmosphere for watching a game, both visually and acoustically. That might explain why Gavin Murray kept his job for so long – maybe it didn’t all seem so bad watching it all from in there!

A reason for this weird perspective I feel being the fact that it was covered by yellow sheet plastic instead of glass, then clear plastic. Was it ever replaced by glass? Just Plexiglas? I don’t know, but would guess probably yes.

Bayview Park’s iconic director’s box in the 1990’s

It was originally white in colour but was painted yellow in the mid 1980’s.

One of my lasting memories of it was the huge cheer that would go round the ground every time a ball was whacked off it.

It was also a good focal point for our “Murray Out” and “Sack The Board” protests of the early 90’s. We knew exactly where to channel all our anger. Not that is seemed to do any good!

It added character to the old ground, something you can never recreate today with a soulless row or section of plastic seats.

Gone but not forgotten, it was one of the structures that made Bayview Park.

View from inside Bayview Park’s iconic director’s box. Thanks to Jim Dick for the photo.