I’ve been meaning to mention a fantastic film on YouTube:
York Rockers 1960s – uploaded by ‘Teddyboy53Rocker’
– in which we are transported through the streets of ‘old York’ via motorbike: what looks like East Parade in Heworth, as well as Spurriergate, High Petergate full of parked cars, etc. Includes several shots of the ordinary folk of York going about their business, including a group of women heading for the Rowntree’s factory, with its factory clock. It’s not a boring ‘tourist’ view of York – quite the opposite.
A memorable representation of ‘real York’, as it was then.
For others, see my ‘Old York on film’ board at pinterest.com
as a man whos loved his motorbikes, and the camaradie of bikes, I can really ‘connect’ with these guys on their bikes.
i think the main featured bike, the one with a sidecar, is a BSA, but its way before my time, i’ll have to ask my dad, this is his era.. speaking of which, the lack of helmets is frightening to my ‘modern eye’, but obviously normal then..
my dad once crashed his Triumph [maybe a Tiger 100], knocked himself out, either no helmet or a very primitive helmet by todays standards, and woke up in hospital… must have been around xmas time, because as he came round his hearing returned first, and all he could hear was xmas carols been sung… my dad started to panic, was he dead? in heaven? how much trouble was he in?
as his senses returned he was greatly relieved to find it was the Sally Army ‘entertaining’ ( ‘terrifying’ in my dad’s case ) the ward…..
Mallory – love that story about your dad! And that there was once a bike called a Triumph Tiger.
The sense of freedom in this film is fab, isn’t it – even to those of us whose experience of being on a motorbike is limited to being on the back of one a few times on trips to Sherburn & various village pubs, years back.
Maybe a modern recreation of this film could be attempted, following the same streets, though it would have to be I think filmed from a bicycle, outside the ‘pedestrians only’ hours in the city centre. (And maybe without the emphasis on attractive women passers-by and their legs ;)