Background
Wallace was born in Darwen, Lancashire.
Wallace was born in Darwen, Lancashire.
He played as an outside left. He played for Blackpool before making his Football League debut for Ardwick in the 1893-1894 season. In 1894 he, together with teammates Mitchell Calvey, Archibald Ferguson and Tommy Little, left Ardwick, by then renamed Manchester City, to play for Baltimore Orioles F.C. in the newly formed American League of Professional Football.
Most of the teams in the league, formed by owners of the National Baseball League in competition with the American Football Association, featured coaches, if not players, from their associated baseball team
The United States. government threatened to investigate the use of foreign professionals, and in face of this threat and the owners" reluctance to subsidise poorly attended matches, the league soon folded. On the players" return to England, Little was forgiven by his former employers and restored to Manchester City"s team
Wallace, on the other hand, was unable to find another footballing employment until he signed for Small Heath in 1897. He played only twice in the league for Small Heath: his "three years of inactivity showed", and after a few months he dropped into non-league football with Hereford Thistle.
Wallace died in Bolton, Lancashire, in 1950, aged about 78.