Old Family Pictures (bike Content)

I came across an old photo album a while ago which appeared to show my Grandfather with a motorbike. I had no idea he had been into bikes when he was younger, so I asked my Dad about it, who confirmed that both my Grandfather and his younger sister (my father’s aunt) had both been big into motorbikes pre-war. The photos I found all had 1937 written on the back.


My grandfather on his bike - I believe it’s a BSA.


I think this one belonged to a friend, who is sat in the side car.


Their bikes together


This one was a really blurred picture but appears to show him ‘showing off’ by jumping over the top of his bike! Quite a feat actually, I don’t think I’d ever have been able to do that.

Apparently his younger sister (Dad’s Aunt Marjorie) wasn’t just a pillion or side car passenger - she owned and rode her own bike. I doubt many young women in the 1930’s had their own motorbike!

During WW2, Marjorie was a hospital nurse, where sadly, she contracted TB and died in 1942 while still in her 20’s. It’s such a shame she died so young - long before I was born - I would loved to have known her.

 

Thanks for the possible identification on the bikes. I thought the top one was one of the bikes in the following pictures, but now you mention it I can see it’s different - different exhaust.

 

After a bit of Googling, I can’t decide whether it was an SS80 or SS100, the exhaust configuration would suggest SS100 but it also says that no two bikes were exactly alike as they were built to order.

either way, way-to-go grandad


SS80

SS100