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The forming of The NHC was first suggested by a few regulars
at Ian Evans's "High Legh Classics" in the summer of 1993 and we had our
first meeting at "The Bear's Paw" on the A50 in October that
year.
Our membership quickly outgrew the meeting room there and in February
1994 we moved our meetings to "The Jolly Thresher".
In the July we held our first rally as a part of "The Stars and Stripes
Event" in Tatton Park.
The following month saw another move of home to the Poplar 2000 Truckstop,
now our Sunday ride-out meeting place.
Following a re-organisation of the Club we returned to "The Jolly
Thresher" in the December when Ian Evans was elected as our President.
In May '95, to save room fees, we moved to "The Axe & Cleaver"
in Dunham Massey and in the July of that year we held the first in a series
of eight "Lakeside Rallies" at Hollingworth Lake.
In the August of '95, "High Legh Classics" (which was by now
called "High Legh Harleys") was bought out by Tommy Young from Southport,
but Ian stayed as our President until the AGM in December, when Tommy
took over the position.
We kept our meetings at "The Axe" until the brewery decided
to convert the pub into a restaurant , which left us with nowhere to meet,
so after checking out various pubs we came across "The Chetwode Arms"
and held our first meeting there in September 1996.
Towards the end of '96 Tommy had a stroke and
felt unable to carry on his Presidential duties, so at the AGM Dennis
Brooks was duly elected to take his place and was re-elected to that position
each year until the end of 2002, when, due to failing health he stepped
down and Bob Latham was elected to take over.
Sadly,
Tommy Young died in February '99 and so "High Legh Harleys" closed its
doors for the last time.
After seven years at "The Chetwode Arms" we had again outgrown
our meeting place, so at the beginning of September 2003, we moved to
"The Cock o' Budworth", I wonder how long it will take to outgrow
"The Cock".
After eighteen months service as President, Bob resigned in July 2004
and we decided not to replace him until the AGM in the December. This
we did, when Pete "Leatherman" Smallwood was elected.
When Joseph Holts, the brewery that owns "The Cock o' Budworth",
announced plans to do a complete refurbishment of the pub, we had to find
another meeting place, so in January 2007, we moved a couple of miles
up the road to "The Antrobus Arms", another biker friendly pub.
Twelve months later, after the refurbishment of "The
Cock" had been postponed indefinitely, we moved back to "The
Cock Of Budworth".
At the AGM in 2008 after four successful years as President, Pete relinquished
his post for personal reasons and John Howard (Little John or Mohican)
was duly elected as his replacement.
In December of 2009, "The Cock's" refurbishment was confirmed
as starting the following month, so with the pub due to close in the middle
of January and be re-designed in such a way as to be unable to cater for
us afterwards, we moved to "Hollins Park Country Club" with
a new night of Monday for our meetings. We held our "Kickstart Summer
Party" in 2010 at Hollins Park but in the June we moved to The Hermit,
on Golborne Rd following its recent refurbishment.
At the AGM in November 2010, our President, Little
John, relinquished his post and was replaced by Tony Bailey, who had been
Treasurer since 1994 (apart from 18 months off for good behaviour) and
he became NHC's 7th President.
We were more than happy at The Hermit, but the local Warrington Council
decided to close the pub down a couple of weeks after our AGM in late
November 2010 which made us homeless once again.
However, due to the hard work of Elaine, a hastily re-organised Christmas
Party at The Mascrat Manor gave us a new meeting place and that's where
we held the first Meeting of 2011. During our first Meeting there it became
obvious that the noise level from the rest of the pub was too disruptive
to our Meeting so we moved to "The Dog & Partridge" for
the next three monthly Meetings. Unfortunately the noise level here caused
the same problem, so in May 2011 we moved to Rylands Recreation Club and
this seems to fit the bill perfectly.
What we do....
Up until 2010, the main Club event
of the year had been the annual rally, the first being held in 1994 at
"The Stars & Stripes" in Tatton Park and then between 1995
and 2002, at Littleborough Rugby Club beside Hollingworth Lake. This is
why we called it the Lakeside Rally .... ingenious, eh? We always held
the Rally over the weekend closest to the 4th July, American Independence
Day.
2003 marked our 10th year of existence, and we had a change of Rally venue
to Winnington Park Rugby Club and change of date (because of the HD 100
year celebrations in Barcelona) to the weekend of the 16th to 18th July.
Because there's no lake in Winnington,
we renamed the Rally "Midgeless 1" 'cos we weren't troubled
by the Hollingworth midges.
After three successful rallies in the "Midgeless" series at
Winnington, in 2006 we moved to a different venue, Moore RUFC, which turned
out to be possibly the best rally we've put on to date. We also renamed
the Rally to "NHC 13", on account of us being the NHC and this
being our 13th Rally. Get it? The clues are there. These were followed
in 2007, 2008 and 2009 by "NHC 14", "NHC 15" and,
spookily, "NHC 16", all successful in spite of different weather
conditions that we endured.
In 2010, we decided a change was needed, and we dropped our Rally in favour
of "adopting" another Club's rally. For 2010 and 2011 we "adopted"
Rainy City HDC's "Rainy Daze 7" & "Rainy Daze 8"
Rallies held in the July of each year.
We also used to host a couple of overnight parties involving a band and
a DJ and the consumption of vast amounts of beer!!
The first of these parties, called "Kickstart Summer" was held in April.
This signifies the start of the season when the sun never stops shining
and we can ride our bikes every day without fear of rain to spoil our
hobby. (Yeah, right!)
The second overnighter, we called "The End of Summer Party" and was held
at the beginning of October to mark the end of the glorious sunny days
when the temperature never dropped below 80 degrees F. Hmm!!
In 2010, we had a re-think on these events as well and although we put
on the "Kickstart Party", we decided to cancel the "End
of Summer Party" in favour of something just for our Members.
We also attend various rallies put on by other clubs throughout the season,
organise Sunday rideouts to different parts of the North West and join
with other Clubs on charity Easter Egg Runs to children's homes nearby.
During the winter months when the dreaded chrome-rotting salt is on the
roads we have other social events, for example tenpin bowling, go-kart
racing, clay-pigeon shooting or anything else our members suggest.
We also usually put on a Christmas Bash for our members and friends, this
also used to involve a band and vast amounts of beer, though the last
couple of years have been a more sedate event, just comprising of a meal
in a pub.
I'd love to
hear from you!
E-mail
Me
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