Editorial
I’d hoped by now to be bringing you an editorial that spoke of how things were virtually back to normal and that it was full steam ahead for events for the rest of the year. However, it seems that it’s going to be a few more weeks until that happens.
Sadly, events are still having to be rearranged in line with Covid-19 restrictions, both national and local – for example, as we were tucking the News pages in and reading them a bedtime story, we heard that the Sussex British Motorcycle Owners Club’s annual open day will be moving from July 10 to July 31, although still at the village hall in Clymping, West Sussex. (Incidentally, the Clymping village hall was designed by Herbert Collins, a noted architect who was responsible for many of the 1920s and 30s terraces in Southampton which are now so sought after. There’s a handy fact for you!)
However, other events will be going ahead, subject to various limitations such as having to book online first.
So, please do check before leaving for an event, just in case. It’s always a wise move and even more so in these times. The majority of shows are very good at keeping details updated online and although I know many of you reckon you are technological Luddites, I also know that’s far from the case! My own dad used to profess to not be able to use the internet and yet somehow he managed to master eBay!
I managed to get out to my first event this year on the second Bank Holiday Monday. It was only a local gathering of vehicles on the seafront, but we loaded up the other half ’s James Captain in our ’46 Chevy truck and spent a happy afternoon just watching people wandering past. That’s something I’ve missed; sitting and people watching. To be able to see folk out and about (and to be able to sit and make very quiet comments about them as they pass!) is a small pleasure, but one nonetheless. Unfortunately, all those people then seemed to join the queue for the ice cream kiosk so I didn’t get a celebratory 99, but it was still a grand day out.
Now, I need your help, wonderful OBM readers. After six months in the editorial chair (which, when I can liberate it from a passing cat, is now more comfortable and has plenty of cushions) I want to know what else you would like to see in the magazine. Obviously, at this time of year we would usually be bringing you coverage of various events, but we’ve tried to keep OBM as informative and entertaining as possible even with the absence of show coverage. You have been very kind with your comments about OBM, but I would like to know if there are subjects or articles you would like to see or suggest.
In the meantime, thank you to everyone who writes in to contribute your letters, reminiscences and stories, and please keep them coming. I don’t think many of you realise just how important your memories are. The history of motorcycling isn’t built on dry facts such as the date that a certain model first rolled off the production line or who owned what company at what time; it’s made up of the experiences of each one of you. It’s Fred Baker’s excitement at seeing the AJS500 supercharged V4 racer or Michael Martin remembering being a small boy watching Bill Hayward on a Baughan trials combination in 1946 (Letters). It’s Alan Graham riding a motorcycle for the very first time or John Deards falling in love with a James Sports Captain (Readers’ Lives). It’s so important that these marvellous memories – that may seem to you commonplace – are preserved. For example, I am too young (well, not even born) to have seen the subject of last month’s cover photo, EJ Potter, at Santa
Pod, but two different people who were there have written in. They described how exciting it was so well that I almost felt that I had been there after all. So when your wife or husband, or your kids or grandchildren, roll their eyes at one of your ‘old bike stories,’ tell them that those stories are important and that OBM wants to hear them. Because we do.