The history of S.S.D. Parma Calcio 1913 covers nearly 100 years of the football from the club based in Parma, Italy. Established in 1913 the club would eventually go on to win titles on the national and international stage. The club is most famous for the period in which it collected all of its eight major titles, between 1992 and 2002. The club was declared bankrupt in 2015.
Early years (1913–1940) A football club was founded in Parma in July 1913 as Verdi Foot Ball Club in honour of famous opera composer Giuseppe Verdi, who was born in the province of Parma, adopting its unique white shirts emblazoned with a black cross on the front. The genesis came about after Verdi's death was commemorated with the dispute of the Coppa Verdi; the players who competed formed the basis of the first team of Parma Football Club, formed in December of the same year. Parma began playing league football during the 1919–20 season, finishing second in Emilian Championship qualifying. In 1922, the president at the time, Ennio Tardini, launched his plans to build a stadium for the club, as Parma initially had no permanent home, having previously used the Piazza d'Armi for two spells, land on the outskirts of the south-east of Parma and the Tre Pioppi. The Stadio Ennio Tardini would be named in the Italian lawyer's honour after he died before the stadium was opened the following year.
Parma were participating in the Emilian regional championship at this point, from which they would qualify to play nationally by performing well. They achieved their first promotion from a regional league during the 1924–25 season, moving from the Seconda Divisione to the Prima Divisione, before becoming founding members of Serie B after finishing runners-up in the Prima Divisione in the 1928–29 season. Parma made their debut in Serie B on 6 October 1929, beating Biellese 2–0. The team remained in Serie B for three years before being relegated to the Prima Divisione at the end of the 1931–32 season, the year before the club changed its name to Associazione Sportiva Parma. Having finished in the top two positions for three consecutive seasons in the Prima Divisione, Parma were accepted into the renamed third tier of Italian football for the 1935–36 season, Serie C, where they competed for the rest of the decade, achieving a best finish of fourth in 1939–40.
Life as a provincial club (1940–1968)
After finishing as runners-up in 1941–42, Parma very nearly achieved a return to Serie B the next year, winning seventeen matches of nineteen and scoring 82 goals to top their group, before progressing to the final, where they would have won promotion but for their disqualification due to alleged corruption on the final day of the season in their match against Lecco. Italian football was then brought to a halt as World War II intensified, although Parma did make an appearance in the Campianto Alta Italia in 1944. Following the restart of organised football, Parma enjoyed three years in Serie B, then split into two regional divisions, before again being relegated in 1948–49 to Serie C after losing their relegation play–off by four goals to one against Spezia in Milan. Il Crociato then spent another five seasons in Serie C, where they finished second place on two occasions before gaining promotion once again in 1953–54 with the help of the prolific Czechoslovakian left-winger Július Korostelev, who scored 15 of the side's 45 goals. While Korostelev headed the scoring charts that year, William Bronzoni was more consistent and remains the club's record league goalscorer to this day, having netted 78 times from 1945 to 1953