RobK
Club Member
New Forest Region 19 HDRCGB
A Brief History
A Brief History
1980s
1981 Malcolm (aka Captain Mannering) joined the HDRGB, met up with Ian (aka Hagar) & started going to club rallies etc.
1982 Malcolm met Feather & along with Ian went to the club AGM at which they met up with Barry & John (aka Fozzy) who were also both locals to the New Forest area (roughly)
At this AGM a vote was taken & the New Forest region was formed with Malcolm as the area rep.
At this time the club meetings were held in the Old English Gentlemen in Lymington every Thursday evening & the club started to expand, often having 10 – 12 regulars turning up.
A couple of rallies were held in the grounds of the Dudsbury Pub near Verwood, we even ran a clay pigeon shot without killing anyone.
We also had several camping weekends in a pub garden in Marston Magna.
Several rallies were run in a field in Langley near Blackfield, these were pretty basic by todays standards but great fun, just having the essential ingredients of a marquee, a band, beer & a loo if you were lucky.
During the early 80s due to Malcolms job commitments the area rep position was filled for some of the time by Barry, Zippy & Hagar with Zippy & Malcolm running it together at one point & with Steve Finney as assistant rep.
Club meets moved to several Pubs after the Old English Gentleman including The Old Mill Holbury, The Swan in Lyndhurst, Beaulieu Road Hotel & The Village Bells at Ealing.
The Isle of Wight started up as part of the New Forest Region later to become a region of their own.
Our region club “emblem” was designed in the 80s as a white on black design then later changed to include the black, green & brown design you see today, it is now reproduced by Fingers on various club products including T shirts & sweatshirts.
We also visted other regions for Xmas parties, notably Devon & West London Harley Riders which we arrived at on one occasion in a double decker bus obtained & driven by Dave the bus, naturally.
Guns & Bobs camping weekends were also a regular feature in our club calendar as although they were originally aimed at HOG members most people that turned up were in fact HDRCGB members.
1990 / 2000s
Over this period of time we had several skittles / camping nights at the Tuckers Grave Pub Norton St Philips.
We also had display stands at the Beaulieu Bike Show, often either with or next to the IOW region, we carried on with this for about 7 years before getting rather bored with the whole thing.
Our rallies started to be run at the Trojans Rugby Club as they still are today, running there without a break apart from two years when it was run at the Winchester Football Club in conjunction with the Winchester Harley Riders.
Attendance at the Trojans rally has often topped the 200 mark.
About 2000 we started using the Foresters in Bishopstoke for club meets, mainly because it was close to a lot of club members & frequented by Dr Bob & Wally, it cant have been too bad as we are still using it now for the 2nd Friday of the Month official meet.
The other official monthly meet is at the Shoulder of Mutton near Bear X, on the 4th Friday of the Month which is run by Buff.
We also have un-official club meets on other Fridays at various Pubs, with the Woodman at Lower Upham having become quite a regular venue.
John (aka JTO) had bought a 45 & attended his first rally at Longleat in 1992 and took over as rep around 2000 & he is still our rep to this day.
JTO has had help in running the region over the years from several assistant reps including Postie, Ron & now Bill, Buff, Patrick & Rob.
Buff has served on the national committee & been reps liaison officer, Ulysses has also been on the national committee.
Many other people put a lot of time into the club with Dave Scot regularly organising the music for rallies & parties, Andy Real Ale putting regular reports of our antics onto the web site & recently Patrick doing a great write up for the Harleyquin.
Compared to the early days we now have quite a large membership (over 50 but the exact number is top secret) with most people willing to put something into the club.
More recently we have had several “Barn” parties with our good neighbours the Sussex Coasters, camping weekends at the Shoulder of Mutton to celebrate Buffs birthday, summer party / camping charity weekends near Dorchester organised by Old Mo & long weekend visits to Dr Bobs in France.
Our region has always given support to the regional, national & international club rallies, with regular attendance at the national rally that was held at Shipley from 1980 to 2003 then at Oswestry & then running the bike show at the Walesby national in 2009.
Over the years we have developed good relationships with all the other HDRCGB regions, but in particular with the IOW, Devon & Sussex Coasters.
We also maintain good relationships with other bike clubs in our area.
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