Alex Emerslie hailed from Dunedin and liked motorcycles, and so did his friends. They called themselves The BSA Boys and were all ex Royal Marines who seemed to enjoy exploring the countryside on their bikes. And as part of those trips they were to capture them on film. It is great that the photos were saved, but only just, but also that the history can be traced as quite a few have inscriptions of the places they visited written lightly in pencil on the back.
And most importantly they were saved by Mike after he came upon a rubbish skip and wondered what interesting trinkets may be found. Yes to some it is called dumpster diving, but to me it is a bit like shopping, wondering what surprises may be contained within. In this case an elderly owner had passed away and his residence was being cleared out. Sticking out of the top of a box was an envelope, tucked nicely away inside were some photos, 20 in total. Mike is not into motorcycling and decided to put them up on Trade Me, surely somebody would be interested? And this is his answer.
A great save for some early New Zealand motorcycling history, even more so that Alex’ story can be told. Thanks Mike.
Perhaps one of their most memorable journeys was when some of them got together for an epic trip north taking in the sites as well as wishing to help out in the aftermath of the big 1931 Napier earthquake. Some of the riders were Doug and Keith Brown, Ian and Alf. Photo 13 of the car with the guys sitting on were all the BSA Boys of Dunedin (and Milton).
I have assembled the photos hopefully into a timeline that may have represented Alex’ active motorcycling years.
From here the photographs are of the BSA Boys trip north. . . . . . .
No more photographs were found but we do know that the happy travellers made it to Rotorua as the last 4 photographs were developed by Iles of Rotorua.
The End. . . .