Darlington Football Club was formed during July 1883. A number of representatives from the amateur and part time teams met and decided to form one club to represent the town. The meeting took place in a local grammar school.

Feethams became the home for the new club. The ground was on lease from John Beaumont Pease in 1866 and the first turf came from the Park ground cricket pitch. Two years after it's formation the club ventured into the FA Cup for the first time and received an 8-0 hiding off Grimsby.

Darlington were one of the original founder members of the Northern League in 1889. Darlo won the title twice in 1896 and again in 1900. The club turned professional in 1908 and decided to join the recently formed North Eastern league. The opening day in the North Eastern League saw the club beaten 5-1 by Sunderland. Later the club started to apply for entry into the second division of the football league.

The club reached the last sixteen of the FA Cup in 1910/11. They started in the first qualifying stage and played eleven games in eight different rounds before finally bowing out against Swindon Town. The club was defeated 3-0 and have never got any further than this stage since. Two years after the FA Cup run Darlington won the North Eastern league. The war had a big impact on Darlington and the club ran into money problems. A works side called Darlington forge Albion bailed them out. Their chairman, Mr J.B Haw paid off the debuts and finished building the east stand at Feethams.

The war finally ended and in 1920 the club finished as runners up in the North Eastern league and won the Durham Senior Cup. The following season Darlington went one better and won the North Eastern league. The club also won election to the third division north of the football league. The first season in the new league was very good and the club finished as runners up. The next season Darlington remained unbeaten at home all season and in the third season in the league finished first and were promoted to the second division.

The second division started with a 0-0 at home to Nottingham forest. Over 13,000 people witnessed the Quakers play their first game in the second division. Their second season in the second division was not as good and the club was relegated back to the third division North. The club remained in the third division until the war. Not a lot really went on until the thirties. In the 1933/34 season the club won the third division North Cup. They beat Stockport 4-3 at Old Trafford.

The second world war limited the amount of football that was able to be played. For the six years the war was on the club only played for three years. Since the local army was based at near by Catterick Darlington did manage to raise a team and got some big name players. Bob Thyne was once such player. He was the first ever Darlington player to play at International level. This came about when he played for Scotland against England in 1944.

The war finally ended. Attendances during the 1948/49 season went up. Over 17,000 people watched the team play against Hull City. Darlo were beat 1-0. On the 28th of November 1955 the club made history. At St James Park, Newcastle, Darlington played Carlisle Utd. It was the first FA Cup match to be played under flood lights. The game was a second round replay and we won 3-1. In 1958 the team became members of the new national Fourth Division and started to encounter teams that they had never before played at Feethams like Coventry City, Watford and Crystal Palace.

The sixties saw a couple of improvements to Feethams. Flood lights were installed. They were used on the 10th of November 1960. The opposition was Millwall and Darlington won 5-2. However an electrical problem set the West stand on fire. The stand was gutted. It was later rebuilt in the exact same style. The tin shed also had a roof put on it during this time and soon after the town end got the name it still has today. The tin shed.

The 60's also bought the higest ever attendance at Feethams. The third round of the League Cup saw Bolton Wanderers come to Feethams. Crystal Palace and West Ham had all suffered defeats at the hands of the Quakers and 21,023 packed Feethams hoping to see a similar result. It was not to be. Bolton ran out 2-1 winners. Darlington did not do very much until 1966. They finished runners up to Doncaster and gained the club's first promotion in forty years. The following season the team flopped and they were relegated again. Near the end of the sixties saw the club get into the last 8 of the league cup. A thrilling game away at Derby saw the Quakers finally loose 5-4.

Between the 1969/70 and the 1979/80 season Darlington had to apply for re-election to the football league no less than five times! Everytime the team was successful. The eighties once again saw the club in a financial mess. The club was forced to raise £50,000 in just six weeks or possibly be kicked out. The fans and people of the town rallied round and the money was raised to save the club. In 1985 the team won promotion to the third division and stayed there for two years. The 88/89 season the club finished bottom of the fourth division and were relegated to the Conference. Brian Little lead the club back into the league at the first attempt and the season after that the club was promoted again as champions. However the promotion was too quick and relegation follow the next season. Darlington were back in the third division.

Things were again quiet until 1996. Darlington rounded off a good year for North East clubs by making it too the third division play-off final. In fact the club could have been promoted automatically on the final day of the season. However they could only draw at Scunthorpe. (The Premiership saw fourth become three) Plymouth were our opponents that day but we lost by one goal to nil.

Things were quiet again after this. Until 1997, the east stand at Feethams, which had stood for many years, was eventually knocked down and a new one built in its place. The construction of the stand however did not do the clubs accounts any good again the club was in another financial mess. George Reynolds, a local businessman came in and saved the club in 1999. He paid off the debuts which were rumoured to in the region of £5 million pounds and started construction of a new 25,000 all seater ground on the edge of the town. In the 1999/00 season Darlington threw away a fantastic chance of promotion and were again in the play-offs. Peterborough were our opponents for this match but just like the trip to the twin towers in 1996 the result was the same. On a wet Friday night Darlington were beat 1-0.

Since then Darlington have not mustered another challenge on promotion since. At the end of the 2002/03 season the club said goodbye to its home at Feethams and moved into the new ground at Neasham road in time for the start of the 2003/04 season. In the last game at Feethams Darlington played out a 2-2 draw with Leyton Orient. The new ground was eventualy named the Reynolds Arena after former chairman George Reynolds.

The Arena's opening match saw Darlington take on Kidderminster Harriers and a large crowd of 11,600 people attended the game. Quakers went down 2-0 against the Harriers but got their first win there in the next home match against Leyton Orient. Matthew Clarke the first ever player to score a Darlington goal in the new ground. Despite the result Darlington never managed to hold on to the fans who came on the opening day and attendances went back to normal. The Arena was clearly too much for Darlington and the finical aspects of the building work were massive. As many had been predicting Darlington went into administration on the 23rd of December 2003. By now Darlington's saviour George Reynolds had become the villain in nearly every fan's eyes thanks to poor PR and several confrontations with fans.

On the pitch Darlington were struggling as well and facing relegation. However David Hodgson returned as manager and managed to guide the club away from the drop zone. After a few false hopes Darlington's main creditors became the club's rescuer. The Sterling Consortium had agreed to loan George Reynolds a substantial sum of money to finish the ground. Rather than lose their investment they attempted to take over the club. However things were not quite so simple and Reynolds dug his heels in. It was only when Sterling started legal action to have the former safe cracker declared bankrupt did he finally let the club go.

One of the first acts Sterling did was to take down the name on the ground. The Reynolds Arena signs were removed on the 22nd of April 2004. Out on the pitch the club continued to progress under David Hodgson and at the end of the 2004/05 season the club finished 8th in League Two and again in 2005/06. Both times the club just missed out on the play-offs. Chairman Stewart Davis eventually sold the club to current chairman George Houghton before the end of the 2005/06 campaign.