in 1959 a small group of BSA FWD owners living in north London began meeting at
each other’s homes, and as numbers increased, in pubs. The main topic of
conversation was of course BSAs, but since a few of these people were members of
the existing BSA club, there was a lot of discussion on what could be done
concerning its plight.
Eventually the decision was taken to approach the
committee and offer to take things over and start again. The affirmative reply
was received with an almost embarrassing alacrity, along with a list of members
and the entire possessions of the Club!
With this mandate our enthusiasts lost no time in hiring a hall (the Priory
Social Centre, Hornsey), circulating their intention to hold an extraordinary
meeting, and generally doing all the things that are necessary to launch a new
club. Colin Bryce recalls visiting Basil Roy Ltd (the one time BSA main stockists) in Great
Portland Street for some spare parts and seeing a note in the showroom
advertising the meeting.
The meeting was held on March 14th 1959, when the
officials of the earlier club proposed that all assets be transferred to the new
club. A committee of six was elected, a new set of rules drawn up and apart from
these formal arrangements, a couple of rallies were organised and a lot of
questions answered, like ‘where do I get front hubs?.
Yes, very much the same
story today! Since most of the members of the existing club joined the new one the membership list
very rapidly rose to 63 by the time the first magazine was published in May
1959.
This first ever edition of magazine coming from the new club was quite
interesting, as you would expect, containing a wealth of technical articles,
plus nostalgia from the beezering past and optimism for beezering to come. It
occupied 16 pages of very small type, was printed by the Edith Williams
Secretarial Service of Welwyn Garden City, at a cost of £7.10.0d for 100 copies
and postage costing 2d (old pence) a copy.‘Front Wheels’ as the magazine was called,
was intended to be produced quarterly, and
in fact issue 2 did appear, but four months later in September.
Thirteen pages
of print, not quite so earth shattering as issue one but nevertheless achieving
quite a high standard of presentation and content. The new familiar monthly
format was adopted in January 1961. The first AGM was held on October 24th 1959,
and by July 1960 the number of members had risen to 136. It is sad to note however,
that having done so much in such a short time, not one of ‘the original nucleus of
founder members was left on the committee by the autumn of 1961. Despite this,
the Club continued to flourish and hopefully improve over the years to form the BSA Front
Wheel Drive Club we know today. Peter Bowler and Colin Bryce