History request - who can help a former member?

[Eleri]

I regularly receive emails through the website about all manner of things. Today's email was the best I've received for a while.

However I need your help - John? Marc? Lindsay?

Here's the email from Vic who now lives in Malaysia

***********
Reading your DHBC webpage it informed me that your Club absorbed the Perersham Amateur Cycling Club where I was a member way back in the 50's,as you may gleam from that I'm now as old as dirt .83 .

May I request if possible the date that that amalgamation took place and if any of the records still exist,at that time Bob Sandberg was our Secetary /Handacapper,ETC.as sometime in the future I will be saddling up for that big bike race in the sky,and would like to see if I could get a copt of the photo of the finish of a race that took place on the 16/9/1950.It was under the control of the NSW Amateur Cyclist Union and known as the 3rd Annual Freebairn Open 112miles.[160.25k]

Eleri I realize that this it a challenging request, but would gladden the heart of this old man as he approaches his final sprint ,I'm encouraged to seek this photo and whatever ,as in some of the research I've done has came up with cycling records going back to early 1900.I feel that it's just possible that someone may have a photo of that finish.

I've tried to find out what happened to the NSWACU Eleri,without success ,could it be possible that you or someone you know may have that information.


PS. Still managing to do 30k a day pulling up just short of a Myocardial Infaction Ha Ha.

Kind regards from an old Wheelman. Vic

[JoTheBuilder]

Hi Eleri,

I found this from 2009:
http://www.dhbc.org.au/forum/viewtopic.php?t=1206

Toff mentions the Petersham RSL Club. It might be worth sending the email to them to see if they have anything else in their archives?

RSL Club: http://www.petershamrsl.com.au/index.ph ... &Itemid=49

[Eleri]

Or we could go and visit! At night out at the RSL! How good would that be. We could take Toff as cover.

Email sent in the meantime.

[Johnj]

Sadly, the chances of finding this particular photo at the RSL are slight (but a fact-finding visit sounds like an excellent idea ). I think the club in question was officially called the Petersham Leichhardt Amateur Cycling Club.

I haven't actually explored the storage areas at the track, but that would be a possible hunting area. The most likely place to find it would be in The Australian Cyclist, but accessing that would necessitate a trip to Canberra.

I have found the results for the 1951 Freebairn Open 112 Miles here. First place went to Fitzgerald (Petersham), Winterbottom (Botany) second, Hocroft (Canterbury) third and Phillips (Petersham) fourth.

[marc2131]

Did a quick search on the Australian National Library's (Canberra) search engine <http://trove.nla.gov.au/ndp/del/search?adv=y> but couldn't find anything from that date involving the Petersham Leichhardt Amateur Cycling Club. Afraid this one will take a little bit of old fashioned, hardcopy footwork to solve ie. visits to archives and/or repositories.

I know Lindsay has one of the only existing copies of Sonia Heathcote and Keith Cohen's 1988 book 'Dulwich Hill Club 1908-1988'. As far as I am aware (been looking around for awhile now), there are no copies in NSW. However there is one copy at the National Library in Canberra. Have never read the contents, but Lindsay told me the book largely looks at post WW2 activities of the DHBC. Assume it would have some info on the period in question.

Lindsay, how about scanning this book and putting it up on the DHBC website?

[Eleri]

I have found the results for the 1951 Freebairn Open 112 Miles here. First place went to Fitzgerald (Petersham), Winterbottom (Botany) second, Hocroft (Canterbury) third and Phillips (Petersham) fourth.

Fitzgerald is our man!

[Simon Llewellyn]

It would be worth asking Arthur Donnelly, he has fond memories of Petersham Club & may know the more information.