Peter Craven

My first speedway memory dates back to the 1940's. My elder brother took me on the train from Liverpool to the Belle Vue Amusement Gardens in Manchester, just after WW2. After some breathtaking rides on the Roller Coaster, we found ourselves at the gates to the Greyhound and Speedway stadium, which had been opened to allow some spectators to leave early. So in we went - for free!!

There was a speedway meeting in progress, and it seems, it must have been a Test Match between England and Australia. This is because I can remember the fact, that there were two brothers riding together, with the name of Parker. Jack and Norman, and it would only be by representing England that they would have been together in the same team. Jack rode for Belle Vue and Norman for Wimbledon.

The occasion so excited me, the smell of combusted methanol and the roar from the bikes (no silencers in those days), that when I read, a year or so later, that the Stanley Stadium in Liverpool was to open up for Speedway, with a team called "The Chads", it was inevitable that I would soon be there on Monday evenings, pressed up against the wall surrounding the track.

Each meeting opened promptly at 7.30pm,with "Twelfth Street Rag" (by Pee Wee Hunt) and followed by "Imperial Echoes", which was the cue for riders, track staff officials, graders, and St. John's Ambulance staff, to march smartly onto the track for the opening of the meeting.

Riders were introduced to the crowd, the stadium lights dimmed, and the racing started. It was pure magic! Mr Chad incidentally was a post-wartime cartoon character, who would pose the question "What no sugar?" or whatever other particular commodity was in short supply at the time. The team comprised, Harry Welch, George Bason, Alex Gray, Doug Serrurier, Fred Wills, Charlie Oates, Alf Webster, and Derek Glover.

This was also the breaking era of Cycle Speedway, and where I lived, near Croxteth, in Liverpool, was a patch of waste ground, which was to play a significant part in the history of British Speedway. This patch became the home of Prestbury Chads, the name being borrowed from the senior speedway team. One warm evening in that first summer of Liverpool Speedway, I was watching the lads pedalling furiously around the cinders of the small oval, along with a tiny crowd including Harry Welch, Doug Serrurier and Fred Wills.

Two of the lads taking part were Brian, and his little brother Peter, of the Craven family, who I knew and who lived in the road next to where we lived. I followed these two budding riders for the rest of that cycle speedway season, and then during the winter I heard of a Speedway school, situated on Ainsdale Sands, to the north of Liverpool. This was run by Charlie Oates, another member of the Liverpool Speedway team. My brother and I braved the foul weather on many a Sunday morning and afternoon during that following winter, to watch Charlie putting novice riders through their paces on the beach. The track was marked out by small sweet bags of sand but was only accessible when the tide went out!

The brothers Craven by then had graduated to speedway proper, and along with other riders such as Don Potter of Fleetwood Flyers, and Angus Maguire of Liverpool, would lap this sand track, coached and cajoled by Charlie, until the tide re-appeared. Peter Craven worked as a trainee mechanic in the garage owned by Charlie in Brunswick Road, Liverpool, and he would ride to his place of work and back home, on his cycle speedway bike passing through the road where I lived.

In the evenings, when the rest of the lads and I were playing football or whatever in the road, Peter would come home on his bike, face covered in oil and grease, dressed in khaki overalls. He would take the corner of our road like the speedway star he was to become, foot placed both well forward and on the pavement, his left brake lever shaped just like the clutch lever on a speedway bike. Most of the lads in our road would jeer and laugh at him, but I preferred to wave and give him a thumbs up. In time he would wave and give me the thumbs up as he passed, ignoring the other lads.

The next speedway season dawned at Stanley Stadium and second half rides were given to novices attached to the track. Amongst them were of course, Brian and Peter. Brian graduated to the team, but never really achieved much at that time, but later in his life he did achieve success in the Pirate league with Liverpool.

Peter also joined the full team, but was never considered to be a great prospect, his style of riding was conservative to say the least. He was so small, that his bike appeared to be twice the size of the normal bike, and his style of riding consisted of planting his bike and left foot firmly on the inside white line, and staying there. Any rider of substance, simply rode around Peter, and that happened continually. I think Jimmy Baxter was in charge of Liverpool at that time, and Jimmy decided to release him. I am not sure, but I believe he went to Fleetwood first, then on to Belle Vue. We all know the rest of the Peter Craven story!!!.

Meanwhile back to the Liverpool Chads. In the close season they had been "moved" from out of the 3rd Division, where they had not set the place on fire, to say the least, and into the 2nd Division. To bulk up the team Jimmy Baxter, who also ran Plymouth Devils and Southampton Saints at that time, merely took Peter Robinson and Len Read from Plymouth, and Bill Griffiths and Buck Whitby from Southampton, plus a developing rider, Reg Duval, and put them into the Chads' team. They were also joined by the great George Newton from Walthamstow, and Tommy Allott from Sheffield.

Both these latter riders were veteran riders from pre-war, and were near retiring age when they joined the team, indeed Tommy used to remove his false teeth, when he went out to race. Nevertheless his machinery and leathers were always immaculate, and his bike probably one of the fastest around. If he got out of the gate first, nobody would catch him around Stanley, and he held the 4 lap record of the 446 yard track at 75 and 2/5ths seconds. He set it when he beat Merv Harding (The Red Devil) of Glasgow Ashfield in one of the most thrilling races I have ever witnessed.

George Newton was the last of the great leg-trailers along with Oliver Hart (Odsal) and he revelled in the wide open spaces of the Stanley track. His bike, "The Copper Flyer" was also a belter, and one of my greatest memories is of George "ear-holing" around the track. The angles he achieved, when he was on song, were similar to those that Peter Craven produced in his prime.

Peter Robinson - Chads' skipper - was a stylist and the anchor of the team, and he paired with George to make a fantastic combination of different styles. Len Read was so small and slight that he had weights added under the saddled of his bike to help him maintain control. Bill Griffiths and Buck Whitby never really achieved greatness, but along with Harry Welch (original skipper) and Reg Duval, and with Peter, George, Len and Tommy, they were an entertaining mid-table team.

The crowds at Liverpool were a consistent 7,000 at this time, and racing was always of a very high standard, any visiting rider willing to open the throttle and have a go, did well at Stanley. I remember well, Les Hewitt (Coventry Bees), Merv Harding - see above - along with Ken Le Breton (White Ghost), Keith Gurtner (Little Boy Blue) all of Ashfield, Arthur Forrest (Halifax), Billy Bales (Yarmouth) and of course the great Jack Young of Edinburgh Monarchs, were riders who could always be relied on to bring in the crowds, and remember this was still the 2nd Division.

Sadly for a number of reasons, by the time 1953 dawned, these crowds had dwindled, and eventually crippling overheads, and the iniquitous Entertainment tax brought an end to that particular era at Stanley. Supporters of the sport made a vain attempt to rally support, but by this time all the principle riders had either moved to other clubs or retired.

I moved away from Merseyside shortly after that, relocating to Southampton, where I was able to follow The Saints for a number of years, and then on their demise, Poole Pirates. I now live in Devon, and was able to follow my favourite sport at Exeter and still get the buzz.

Arthur Maltby:

"Thanks for this trip down memory lane. I recall all these riders and many others. Whenever I pass near where the Chads rode, I seem to smell the shale, hear the bikes, and see vendors selling "Speedway Echo" or "Speedway Gazette". A long time ago, but the activities of youth stay in the mind."  

 

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