Vintage Motorcycle Club South Durham Section
We meet on alternate Thursday evenings at Middleton St George Cricket Club at 8.00 pm. The first meeting of the month is generally a business meeting, where we plan forthcoming events.
History
A brief outline history of the formation of the South Durham Section is given here. The full detailed history written by Eric Londesbrough is available in two volumes, Part 1 detailing the first ten years, and Part 2 detailing the period 1987 to 1996. These can be obtained for a modest price from the section. The information here is extracted from Eric’s first volume.
The VMCC was founded in 1946. Two of the early sections in the area were the North East whose meetings were held at Boroughbrige, and the Northumbrian section up in Tyne & Wear, leaving a large area without a local meeting place.
In 1975 a small group of VMCC members led by Brian Bean rectified this situatation & having corresponded with the then National Secretary Eric Thompson a section based near Darlington was formed, and with assistance from the local paper, an inaugural meeting was arranged for Tuesday 9th December 1975 at the Three Tuns at Sadberge at 7.30pm.
The picture below, which appeared in the Northern Echo shows the five section founders with their machines
The meeting took place and was attended by about 60 people, 39 actually signed the
register. The chair was taken by Bill Hume who explained the working of a VMCC section and proposed that the South Durham Section be formed. A committee was formed. The agenda and the hand written minutes of that first meeting are reproduced below along with the Northern Echo report.
One of the agenda items was a road safety run which was organised for the 28th December (maybe there wasn’t as much salt on the roads then). The start and finish being the Three Tuns at Sadberge. The route sheet shown here gives the distance as 28 miles, the start time was 10.00am and the entry fee 25p. The weather was described as reasonable and 13 riders took part. A system of timing was used but the final result was decided by questions on the Highway Code, which still cause problems for some to this day. The winner was Bill Lincoln riding a Royal Enfield.
The next meeting took place on 13th January 1976. It was decided already that one meeting per month would not be sufficient and the decision was made to increase the meetings to two per month, something which continues to this day.
Hill climbs trials and road runs were suggested and it was agreed to arrange these as soon as possible. It was decided to invite Titch Allen to speak at a future meeting. This took place in February when Titch entertained members with a talk on the early days of the VMCC.
During the first year, some of our runs which continue to this day were given their first outings.
23rd May 1976 first Quaker Run, Brian Bean Secretary of the meeting, Les Dixon, Anderw Dawson Cerks of the course. Distance 89 miles, Start Sadberge, lunch stop C.B. Hotel Arkengarthdale, 19 riders, winner R. Rowland BSA Trike.
16th June 1976 first Sunset Run organised by George Robinson. Start Sadberge 10 riders, winner T. Murray
26th September 1976 first Baydale Run, Nick Robinson clerk of course. There was a strange formula applied to the mileage for the run dependent on age of machine, also penalties for arriving back early or late. Winner Eric Londesbrough BSA 350 (who still regularly gets awards on our runs)
During the first year the section started it’s tradition of away wins with The Rookhope Ride, where South Durham entered two teams, six teams competed. The winners were South Durham B Olly Downes, Ron Fisher, Brian Bean & Nick Robson.
The year concluded with the first Dinner Dance held at The North Eastern (now The Coachman) on 1st December, and the first AGM held on the 14th December. Olly Downes retired from Chairmanship, Brian Bean from Secretary. Gerry Beer was elected chairman and Eric Londesbrough as secretary.