Here is an odd corner of our collective history, but an instructive one.
The Isle of Man has always been a cycling island, thanks I suppose to a certain backwardness and a tardy adoption of the motor car. There are 500 miles of lanes for the tourist. At least three clubs have looked after the native wheelmen. Racing was always popular and in former days there was a macadam track in Douglas’s Oucham Park. The person who made his native place into an international centre of cycling was a journalist, Curwen Clague. When he wasn’t on the bike Clague worked for the Isle of Man Examiner. Since he was a competent editor he was on terms with the island’s right-wing but eccentric government. Clague also knew the leaders of local industry. There wasn’t much money in fishing, nor in agriculture, so that industry was mainly tourism.
In the 1920s and 1930s there had already been contacts between the clubs in Man and their counterparts in Ireland and the British mainland. Merseysiders went to Man for holidays. Manx cyclists put their bikes on the ferries to compete in Cheshire and Lancashire. Curwen Clague saw how these cycling habits could be expanded. His idea was to promote a road race within the series of events that, since 1907, had given the Isle of Man its position in the world of motorcycle sport.
A harmless and maybe profitable venture, said the Tynwald, the Manx parliament. The island’s elders also offered to close the roads to other traffic on the day of the cycle race, which would never have happened on the mainland. Furthermore, massed-start racing was opposed, even forbidden, by the governing bodies of British cycling. Fortunately, the men of the House of Keys had no interest in the policies of the National Cyclists Union or the Road Time Trials Council. They would govern their own island as they wished. So, in 1936, the first of the Manx international road races was held on a course that had already been established by motorcyclists. A 373/4 mile circuit took riders from sea level at Douglas, first to Ramsey and then up a 5-mile climb to a point at 1,384 feet on the mountain of Snaefell. There was a thrilling descent before a return to the finish at Douglas. The winner of the race was a Birmingham man, Charlie Holland of the Midland Cycling and Athletic Club. In later years competitors have ridden this circuit three times, covering 1133/4 miles.
From the height of Snaefell on a clear day it is possible to see the mountains of Mourne in County Down, more mountains in Galloway, yet more mountains in the Lake District and the peaks of Snowdonia in Wales. There is a theory that the Isle of Man has a share of four countries and possesses some of the character of each of them. It is hard to define such a mixed character. What data might we use for evidence? The names of the boarding houses that formerly gave a welcome to cyclists must tell us something. For the modern essence of Man is not in its agriculture or religion (Methodist), nor in anything preserved by the National Trust, since nothing at all on Man has attracted that Trust. It is rather in the wealth of small houses, terrace after terrace of them, that were lodgings for holidaymakers.
An abbreviation of my master list of their names goes as follows.
Ballasalla
Rosegarth
The Oban
The Winston
South View
Greg-Malin
Thiseldo
Stoneleigh
Woodside
Mannin
Annandale
Hollyrood (sic)
Ellesmere
Palatine
Wavecrest
A bit of mainland patriotism here, some Scottishness, a more pronounced hint of Ulster than of the Republic of Ireland, one or two remnants of the ancient Celtic tongue of the Manxmen. Palatine is an obscurely boastful name for a boarding house. These places of lodging have masculine-sounding names, with the exception of Thiseldo, which I think must be a contraction of ‘this will do’.
Also masculine and gritty are the indigenous family names of Man. Here were born the Caines, Cregeens, Crellins, Kermodes, Kewleys, Killips and Quayles. Once they worked the land and scratched for its sparse mineral deposits. Some went to sea in the herring boats. Then they entered the lodging-house business or were employed in catering, amusement arcades, dance halls and the adventurous network of electric railways.
After the war the pattern changed again. Agriculture and fisheries went into further decline. The native population decreased. Young people were the most likely to leave. The older people of Man were joined by retired couples from the surrounding four countries, who often supplemented their pensions by opening guest houses. Old British club cyclists were among this influx. They had enjoyed their Manx holidays and preferred to live in Douglas than in Liverpool. There is also an Italian community on the island. Most Manx Italians were in Douglas because they were interned there during the war. Then they saw no reason to return to mainland Britain, especially if they were in the catering businesses. Some of the Italians, like the Signorio family of the Mannin guest house, were cycling fans and took block bookings from clubs.
The British interned Italians; and the Germans kept Curwen Clague in a prisoner-of-war camp for the duration of the conflict. Back home and back on the bike, Clague used his demobilisation period to make plans for the future of cycling. The Manx holiday calendar worked by the week rather than by day trips. Clague saw the opportunity for six consecutive days of varied cycling events and realised his vision in the Manx Cycling Festival, which was to grow until the early 1960s. In the 1950s thousands of cyclists regularly packed into the steamers for their holiday in Douglas, Ramsey or Peel. By day they raced or toured. Each night they went to the dance halls or the pubs (which had notably long opening hours). Clague was certain that his festival should occupy the same week of every June. He was right. Under his direction ‘Isle of Man Week’ became cycling’s equivalent of the Lancashire Wakes Week or the Birmingham Industrial Fortnight, when so many factories were closed or operated at half strength.
Clague’s programme included time trials, team time trials, the long mountain time trial around the Snaefell circuit, kermesses, Britain’s only summertime hill climb, various holiday games and contests (‘Miss Bicycle Belle’) and of course the international road race. In 1946 it had a French winner, Jean Baldessari, who went on to a professional career and rode the Tour de France in 1950–1. A more notable winner at Douglas would be Ercole Baldini. He won in his last year as an amateur, 1956, and a couple of months later, even before he had signed professional forms, took the hour record on the Vel Vigorelli. In 1958 Baldini was the world professional road champion and also came first in the Giro d’Italia.
By 1959 there were continental professionals at the Isle of Man Week, with entries from France, Italy and Spain. The pros included Jacques Anquetil, Federico Bahamontes, Louison Bobet, Fausto Coppi, André Darrigade and Raphael Geminiani. The top men of the day, they arrived in state at the little airport at Castletown. They didn’t race hard, but at least they had come to the Isle of Man. Their presence pleased everyone, especially no doubt Jim Hinds of the Southern Roads CC, who won the international race in front of these legendary champions.
So, in the unlikely venue of the Isle of Man, some of us could feel that British and continental cyclists were becoming closer. But we were still British, in our old ways and modest aspirations. I remember 1959. It was my year of dreams. Bahamontes won the Tour. Alf Engers, of the Barnet CC at that time, reduced the British 25 record to 55.11. I was shaving my legs and doing 300 miles a week, fantasising about going to spend a week on the Isle of Man. What a steamer journey from Fleetwood to Douglas, chugging across the wide straits of Colwyn Bay … I imagined a place where tailless cats chased red squirrels, where I might meet a Bicycle Belle and perhaps ride in the lesser races. Fun and glory in the land of kippers and fairy lights! The plan came to nothing, like most of my cycling projects at that date and ever since.
On a bike you can go anywhere – and in my own book, if I wish, I can go on and on about the Isle of Man. Curwen Clague died in 1981, but his enterprise continues to this day. For some time the cycling festival has been directed by Desmond Clague and the annual ‘Curwen’s Race’ is ridden in his father’s memory. Long may