I was lurking around the message board a while ago (as I'm prone to do) when the subject of riding apparel was being discussed. I thought about my own progression through the motorcycling riding gear jungle and the path that I took…

The year was 1951. I was an underpaid engineering apprentice, earning very little money (about £2.10s). I had saved up enough ready cash to enable me to buy a 1949 BSA D1 rigid Bantam, and this is where my nostalgic protective clothing memories began.

My first kit, if it could be so called, was accumulated before I got the bike, and consisted of a pair of steel-capped safety working boots. To keep out the draughts I had my works boilersuit under an old long raincoat to keep out the rain, 0r so I thought, plus some kid gloves that were past their best for weekend wear (everybody seemed to wear gloves for best in those days). This ensemble was all topped off with my 'safety' headgear of one grey beret with a French style 'chimney' plus ex-WD teargas goggles to hold it on.

The Saturday for collection of my new steed arrived so, armed with my brand new provisional driving licence, only 5/-, and dressed in my assembled collection of weather wear, carrying my insurance cash, I sallied forth into the depths of Halifax on what had been my usual form of transport, a Halifax Corporation double decker bus. On arrival I went straight to the Royal Insurance Co Ltd and spent my hard earned money on a TPF&T policy, the cheapest they had available: times were hard.

I completed the purchase of the Bantam and I donned the rest of my gear; beret, goggles and gloves, and was given full driving instructions by the salesman before I departed. Clutch; left hand, brake; right hand, gears; right foot, one down two up, back brake; left foot, that's the kickstart above the right footrest. Right, come on then, off you go!

That trip home taught me how to control the bike (I had never ridden one before, but knew what all the controls did) and brought home to me that the kit I was wearing wasn't in the least appropriate. My fingers were cold, my raincoat kept blowing back off my knees, my knees were frozen and a draught blew constantly down the back of my neck. I was absolutely frozen when I had ridden the five miles back home. Clearly something must be done! And this was the middle of summer.

I was on the scrounge once again, an old double breasted overcoat (Dad had had it for years) was tried on and it fitted, it was of the same thickness and quality as an army greatcoat, double breasted with plenty of overlap and length for knee coverage, and was more rainproof than my old raincoat. For a scarf I appropriated a towel from Mum and she was kind enough to cut it lengthways and sew it together making it long and thin. This would have the ability to soak up any rain that could be trying to get down my neck hole. The beret was deemed adequate, as were the gas goggles. After all, speedway riders used them all the time in pairs, flicking off the top pair when they got dirty. What's good enough for them is good enough for John, I thought. The only thing needed now was to spend some apprentice pay on some wind- and waterproof gauntlet gloves.

The gauntlets were obtained as soon as possible and all seemed OK until the rains came. That was when I realised that boots, while being strong and protective, couldn't cope with the wet that ran off my soaking trousers down my legs into the boots. This just wouldn't do. It had to be wellies on the ride to work and carry the boots with me to change into, but then my knees still got wet. This was solved by borrowing (again from Dad) some fireman's leggings that he used when he was on the nightshift at work and had to walk to work in the rain. These comprised a pair of tubular-shaped waterproof legs that went down from my thighs to cover the wellie legs, and were hung from the braces buttons on my trousers by a long strap.

I carried on in this vein until I exchanged my Bantam to buy a garden-gate framed ES2, a bigger and better machine that was to be used while I did my National Service in the RAF. National Service and my 21st birthday sort of coincided and for my birthday my parents splashed out and bought me a D Lewis husky black PVC riding coat. This had a flap that dropped down from inside the back of the coat and was then fastened up inside the front. It meant that I didn't sit on a wet seat when it rained but on the inside of the coat. I was also presented with a 'Tuffler' which turned out to be a towelling scarf - I'd been here before!

Helmets weren't compulsory at that time but I fancied emulating a certain GE Duke (who rode a similarly framed bike, so I could ride in a helmet like his). The safety aspect didn't come into it; I just wanted to be a poser. I also used a silk-ish square over my mouth and chin with the ends fluttering, Biggles-like, behind me in the breeze. I invested some more money in an ex-WD pair of Mk8 flying goggles, Biggles-like again. I had arrived.

It wasn't until I was demobbed that I bought my first Barbour suit. I bought it in the approach to winter 1954 and found that it was a lot colder than the black PVC coat, as it was cotton and wasn't totally windproof. However it was waterproof and a lot more comfortable to wear. To get over the cold I bought an ex-WD (again) leather jerkin, which did the job. I still retained my wellies, eventually replacing them with industrial reinforced toe cap ones and it was quite a few years before I got around to leather boots. These were NOT ex-WD but ex-fire service black boots with pull-up straps on the sides, similar to today's Rigger boots.

Classic Hats on Right Now......

When I consider the riding gear as described above and what today's riders have to have from scratch: armoured gloves, elbow protection, back protection, knee sliders, colour co-ordinated leather suits with matching helmets that weigh a ton, big reinforced boots, etc, etc, I think I got off lightly. Given what I could afford to spend in the olden days, and the lack of disposable income to buy the 'necessities' of proper motorcycle clothing, then if I had been forced to buy all that lot I would still have been catching the bus to get to work.

Not to worry. I think that we had the best of the riding days with all those nearly empty roads, endless bend-swinging and careless abandon of life in the 1950s and 60s. Plus the wall-to-wall sunshine. Don't you remember the wall-to-wall sunshine? We always enjoyed it then!

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