Whereas the club dragged it's heals on coming up with an official web site, several enthusiastic Wuppis were inspired by this page to start their own pages, so that WSV is now well represented on the internet.

Now there is probably some wise-guy over in Deutschland who will lay claim to being the first, but if so, nobody ever saw it, except maybe his mother.

However you can never take away the fact that this was the first, and shows the true mark of the dedicated WSV supporter. Afterall, it would be easy to produce a web page in Wuppertal, since there is basically nothing else to do except drink beer, watch WSV and then drink more beer. Of course, if you're the worldly type, you could hop on the train to Gelsenkirchen and watch Schalke, but that's only when WSV isn't playing.

This page is produced in San Francisco, California, by a dedicated fan who spent a few years in purgatory, oops, I meant Wuppertal, when he was a schoolboy. I wasn't old enough to do the drink beer part, but I did see just about every WSV match in the Zoo (and many ASV match at Am Gelben Sprung).

"Why isn't it in German?", you may ask. To tell the truth, I did have a German version for a while, but mainly it was too much of a pain in the ass to keep both versions running and insynch. Besides, it takes 10 times as many words to say something in German. For example, a German would say something about player like "Seine Leistungen sind von seinem Bankholzsplinterimarschverletzung durchaus negativ beeinflüßt.", whereas an American would simply say "He sucks."

Since I haven't clue what is really going on over there, I am fortunate to have had assitance from several Wuppis and others who have provided me with relevant information, at least when they're sober:

Hans-Jochen Classen, Jörn Janssen, Rolf Deiss, Patrick Diebenbusch, Hans-Werner Kegel, Michael Moll, Frank Schroeter, Thorsten Werner and Peter Lucas

As for myself, I once was a decent soccer player, having learned my craft on the fields of Am Gelben Sprung and Windhornstrasse. I spent many a happy day slamming dozens of goals for "WSV" past the "Rot-Weiss Essen" keeper (my brother). Of course, when I got older, play got more serious. Here's a recent photo of me in action...

If you would like to participate in the task of spreading WSV in cyberspace, please feel free to drop me a line at John Dwyer (jtdwyer@sonic.net) .

Meanwhile, the gospel of WSV-Pacific Edition continues to spread, even back in Jolly old Deutschland: