Firstly I was stopped on the path along the B1172 by Ali Wardale who had been reading my blog and heard about my interest in old speedway programmes - some of which I'm trying to put together as part of my own personal history.
Ali kindly passed on some very interesting programmes which gave a wonderful insight into the sport and also how things were well over 60 years ago.
The oldest was from September 1946 and was Norwich's match against Sheffield at The Firs Stadium. It was so cool to hold something in my hands from 74 years ago. To me the important thing about these documents is their history. Remarkably you can buy them on E-bay for a few pence but you can't put a price on the memories and historical importance.
The others (now nicely mounted in a folder) included an England v Australia test match in Norwich on 20th June, 1953, and a World Championship Final at Wembley Stadium in September 1952. That final was won by Australian Jack Young who was defending his title. He was the first Australian to win two world championships in any form of motor sport.
Another of the programmes seemed to be as much about the war as it was about speedway.
This was the Northern Trophy Final between Norwich and Sheffield held at The Firs on Saturday, September 14th, 1946. Norwich were in fourth place in the Northern League. It's difficult to think of Norwich being a northern city when some of the others were Sheffield, Middlesbrough, Newcastle and Glasgow. It was a very tight league with Norwich just four points behind leaders Sheffield.
It looks as if this may have been a two leg final as Norwich won 61-35 on the night and 106-85 overall having been narrowly beaten 50-45 in the first leg. For the record the Norwich team was Paddy Mills, Wilf Jay, Ted Bravery, Don Houghton, Bert Spencer and Sid Hipperson.
The thing about the programme is that it featured articles on the war by Air Commodore G. Spencer CBE and C. W Willmott who was chairman of the Speedway Supporters' Club, details of an RAF night at Norwich Speedway and articles about Warrant Officer Bluey Thorpe who was on loan from Wembley, Corporal Paddy Mills, Sergeant Spud Murphy. There's an in depth article attributed to Eric Fowler who I assume is the former Eastern Counties Newspaper journalist who wrote under the name of Jonathan Mardle.
Then there's a picture of Wing Commander "Johnny" Johnson DSO, DFC, who is described as "one of the most well known Battle of Britain pilots" and who "lives in this district" and is "married to a Norwich girl.
A Google search on Johnson documented his RAF career and also had this to say:
"On 14th November, 1942, Johnson married Pauline Ingate in Norwich during home leave. Hugh Dundas acted as best man and Lord Beaverbrook's son, Wing Commander Max Aitken also attended. During the war Pauline worked for the Fire Service. They had two sons: Michael (16 October 1944) and Chris (born 1 December 1946). After the couple split up, Johnson lived with his partner, Janet Partridge.
In the middle of the results in the programme are the words: "God Save The King."
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Coming back to the present day it was a deliberate detour on our walk to buy some cupcakes from a house in Priory Road.
I had a lovely chat with the Matless family who have been raising funds to help a young Hethersett girl fight bone cancer. Sherree, Mark and their daughters will be selling the cupcakes every morning between 10 and 11 am until the weekend. In the first week they raised £400 and will easily meet their target of £500 by the end of this week.
I came home and wrote a story for the Eastern Daily Press and hopefully it will appear in the near future.