The game of association football had been played in Dunedin for at least fourteen years before the formation of Northern. In 1887 a special meeting of about twenty followers of the Association game was held, and in 1888 clubs called Northern and Southern were started. The Northern club was formed slightly earlier than the Southern Club and commenced playing in Brown’s paddock in North East Valley, next door to Mr Glendining’s home, Northvale.
The Southern club played at Tahuna and later at the Kensington end of the Caledonian ground. Various other clubs formed in the city, although often they did not last because of the difficulty of recruiting players. Northern also struggled to retain players in those early days so by the 1894 season there was only one senior player left to carry on – Andrew Sharp, who got a group of 16-year-olds together to make up the senior side. From notes provided in 1963 for the 75th Jubilee by Peter Young, who was a Patron of the club and one of those young men, comes the following:
“In the 1899 season we were doing very well, the Roslyn team at that time being the best team in the grade, but in about July 1899, we played them on the Gardens Ground, and gave them a good game of it. I heard their captain say to a spectator, “We should put on 10 goals today,” but they did not. I reckon that this match was the start of Northern Club’s success in getting to the top. At that time, the two top teams in the second half of the competition played off for the (Charity) Banner. So we played off with Roslyn on the Kaikorai football ground and it was a great match in which we were beaten by 5 goals to 4. The Northern Club never looked back after that and has usually been knocking at the door for first place.”
Northern AFC was founded in 1888, it is the oldest continuous running football club in the southern hemisphere. Before the formation of the Southern League competition in 1968, Northern was the winner of the Top competition 14 times (1927, 1948, 1949, 1950, 1951, 1952, 1953, 1954, 1956, 1958, 1959, 1960, 1961, 1962).
Proud of its history, Northern is one of the more successful teams in Dunedin in terms of Chatham Cup appearances, with eight finals appearances. Two of the club's proudest moments were in 1959 and 1961, winning the Chatham as well as the Rothman Cup in 1962.
In 1972, in response to low player numbers, it was decided that the Maori Hill (established 1904) and Northern senior clubs would amalgamate in the interests of football in the north end of Dunedin, and so North End United was formed. At the junior level, both Maori Hill and Northern maintained their individual identities with both junior clubs feeding into the senior Northern AFC. In 1990, it was decided the Club would revert to the historic Northern AFC name for the 1991 season onwards.
In recent years, the premier women's team had the Dunedin women's premier title in 2005, 2006, and 2007. In 2008 and 2009, the Club also won the Hanlin Shield, which is given to the most successful club in Dunedin from juniors to over-35s.
There are now more than 200 playing members at Northern, with a large student contingent; the two junior clubs (Maori Hill Juniors and Northern Juniors) boast player numbers of over 300 at Maori Hill and 150 at Northern Juniors
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