Bikers from all over Furness descended on the Lake District village of Hawkshead for a special gathering for owners of vintage bikes in 1992.

They came with bikes large and small, bikes that had seen better days and bikes that had never been in “better nick”. And they came with bikes with emotive names like Excelsior, Francis Barnett, OK-Supreme, Rudge and Husvarna.

They compared notes, literally, like revving up the engine notes of Ernest Atkinson’s 1948 Manx Norton 348cc vehicle.

Ernest, from Kirkby, had ridden the machine on the roads since 1954.

Ernest’s wife, Cora, admitted helping to keep the machine in trim. “I gave it a dust now and then,” she said.

The love that riders had for their aged motorbikes was also echoed by another Norton owner-rider, Arthur Cottis, 68, a retired VSEL estimating officer from Birkett Drive, Ulverston.

He was a founder member of the Furness British Motor Cycle Club, which was six years old, with 53 paid-up members and which met fortnightly at the New Inn, at Marton.

Arthur had no doubt about the potency of Nortons.

His own beloved 1952 ES2 model had the attributes, namely rear plungers and Roadholder forks, that, as he said, “made British bikes unbeatable when Ray Amm and Geoff Duke won everything going.”

Brian White, 39 of Lincoln Street, Barrow, was present with a Harley Davidson 790cc and sidecar as used by dispatch riders in the Canadian Army during the liberation of Europe.

VSEL foreman palter Charles O'Neil, 55, from Hawcoat, Barrow, was there with his immaculate 150cc Bantam Major. "I paid £5 for it in 1969, now its worth at least £1,000," he said.

Graham Armistead, 50, from Swarthmoor, a manager at Oxleys, had the poignant experience of selling his Royal Enfield Bullet in 1964 and finding it again in 1990 among a job lot of motor cycle parts.

"I'll never let it go again" he said.