I'm Forever Blowing Bubbles was adopted by West Ham's supporters in the late 1920s and is now one of the most recognisable club anthems in English football along with the similarly adopted "You'll Never Walk Alone", "Blue Moon", "Blue is the Colour" and "Blaydon Races". "I'm Forever Blowing Bubbles" was introduced to the club by former manager Charlie Paynter in the late twenties. A player, Billy J. "Bubbles" Murray who played for the local Park School had a resemblance to the boy in the "Bubbles" painting by Millais used in a Pears soap commercial of the time. Headmaster Cornelius Beal began singing the tune
Autumn Leaves (painting) on Millais' sisters-in-law Alice and Sophy Gray, are portrayed in middle-class clothing of the era; the two on the right are in rougher, working class clothing. The painting has been seen as one of the earliest influences on the development of the aesthetic movement. The painting has typically been interpreted as a representation of the transience of youth and beauty, a common theme in Millais' art. Malcolm Warner argues that Millais was influenced by the poetry of Tennyson, at whose house he had once helped to rake together autumn leaves. Warner suggests that lines from Tennyson's song "Tears, Idle Tears"