MCC Centennial Scrapbook

The Motor Cycling Club is the oldest of its kind,founded in 1901 and soon catering for cars as well as bikes. For its first centenary, the MCC has published First Hundred— A Centennial Scrapbook, compiled by president John Aley and Tom Threlfall. Tom first rode in the famous Land’s End Trial in 1953 on a 350cc Douglas and edited the Club’s magazine Triple from 1983 to 1999.

The Scrapbook is great entertainment, as well as a good guide to MCC events. Pictures abound, from a competing Vespa scooter and Reliant breadvan to Lady Mary Grosvenor’s Allard and trials cars. Serious articles on Edge and Jarrott are backed up with pieces on MCC life, cartoons, drawings and colour pages. Daphne Freeman, rally driver, contributes a jolly piece about MCC personalities, I was persuaded to recall what the MCC did at Brooklands, and there is a Motor Sport report on a trial I did as navigator in a Buckler, which I had forgotten I had written.

And I have to forgive a misquote which makes me an OBE; but I cannot have credited a Trojan with 85mph! Of course, bikes are there in force. It costs £50 to members, £75 otherwise, p&p £2, from J Aley, 20 Old Shipyard Centre, East Bay, Bridport, Dorset DT6 4HG.