Hilda Fox, life member
CW: Have you always been a Duk? HF:
More or less. My husband was the president when we met, through bike riding. So I just naturally became one when we married when I was 20, although I couldn’t technically join until the late 60s when they finally let women in. I’ll be 94 in November, so I’ve been here a long time. All the members are my Ducklings — I’ve watched them join and grow up on bikes, along with my daughters, their husbands and my grandchildren. It’s a big family. I’ve only just started to take a step back from things, as until recently I’ve always had jobs like club secretary or president. Everyone knows me so well.
CW: How did you get into riding? HF:
I just love bikes so much. My mum thought I was crackers, and my dad said I couldn’t ride one. But when I was 14 I managed to get half a crown a week to buy a bike, and taught myself by just riding and falling off, until I managed to stay on it. Then I rode to Blackpool and back by myself!
CW: What has been your greatest achievement on the bike? HF:
Coming third to Beryl Burton and Millie Robinson in the National 100 in 1958 was special. It was totally out of the blue. It was raining, so it was my kind of day and I just woofed it round. But my biggest achievement was riding end to end for my 70th birthday. photographs of past and present members.
“You need to speak to Hilda about who’s who,” says club member Ann Luckock. “She’s been with the club since forever, she knows all the members, past and present. She’s supported us all, wiped our tears and grazes, and of course celebrated with us.”
“She was a great racer in her day too,” chips in Holt, “racing time trials on the road, as well as the track at Fallowfield. She’s nearly 94 years old and still rides her bike daily.”
Today the club is made up mostly of veteran riders, which could lead you to think club runs were carried out at a pedestrian pace. But like fine wine, members of Dukinfield CC seem to get better with age, and today’s run is chipped out at nearly 16mph — not bad considering the 40-mile ride also contains nearly 1,530 feet of climbing, a wind and almost constant rain.
“There’s a few rides that go out weekly,” club captain Martin Gray tells me. “There’s an introduction ride most Saturday mornings for a couple of hours, then Sunday is club run day, and we often ride midweek too. There’s also a keen group of mountain bike riders that meet weekly.
“We’re big fans of night riding,” add tandem duo Phil Cunningham and Brian Anthony. “We’ve been known to head out for a ride starting at 11pm at night or the early hours of the morning and ride into the dawn. It’s so peaceful at that hour.”
“And enjoying riding at night means that you don’t have to ride in the day if it’s raining,” Cunningham says, raising his eyes to the sky in reference to today’s weather, which has almost been constantly wet.
“Ah, rain never stopped us playing out,” laughs Gray. “In fact today has been perfect weather for Duks!”
Club history
Dukinfield Cyclists’ Club, commonly known as ‘the Duks’, is one of the oldest clubs in the country, having been established on March 17, 1885. It is thought that the club was born out of a cycling section of Dukinfield Harriers (now East Cheshire Harriers) when John Norton White, a surveyor from nearby Stalybridge, gathered together 10 of his friends who had an interest in cycling for a meeting at the Astley Coffee Tavern in Dukinfield, where the club was born.
The first recorded event was September 14, 1889 with the club’s first 25-mile time trial held on a course around Macclesfield, Monks Heath and Congleton.
According to
Dukinfield CC records, these early time trials have always been run as a handicap event, making it highly likely that the event was unpaced, bringing the record for the world’s first time trial forward by five years.
In the 1920s members and brothers, Albert and Stan Livingston became well known nationally for winning many open time trials. However, it was in the 1930s and 40s that the club was most successful, with Doug Hartley, who won nearly 100 open events, and the 1944 BBAR Team competition with fellow Dukinfield riders Norman Howe and John Bell.
In more recent times prominent riders have included Steve Butterworth, Jimmy Froggatt and Rob Nelson, while multiple national champion and GB international local rider Angela Hunter has always been a second claim Dukinfield CC rider, and still rides regularly with the club.