Saints Memorabilia

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TheSecondStain said:
I came across a couple of Saints Speedway programmes from their final Championship winning season. They were my eldest brother's. He still has loads of those from the early 1950's right to the end. I must get around to re-uniting him with them. Think I borrowed them to scan the programmes to a Speedway history enthusiast on Saints Forever, and that's a few years ago. Anyone remember? Here's an example:

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Strange to think of it these days, but in the pre and post war years, the Saints were easily as big a draw as the Saints football team. Indeed, many supporters would go to both. I can just remember the house practically emptying every Tuesday evening, leaving just me and my parents, as my older brothers and sisters would attend Bannister Court Stadium for a night of racing and Castro R. Although the speedway stadium was just a couple of hundred yards up the road from The Dell, and we lived in the suburbs, if the wind was in the right direction, one could hear the unsilenced roar [no silencers on racing bikes in those days] and smell of the bikes as they roared around the floodlit track. I can't remember 100% for sure being taken to Bannister Court although I think so. I was definitely taken to Wembley Stadium a couple of times for the World Championship Final. Note that the Bannister Court programme above is hosting World Championship eliminator semis. There would have been a corresponding eliminator up North. Possibly Belle Vue, in Manchester.
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That site became the Top Rank and is now a housing estate.
 
fatletiss said:
Top Tank round the corner from The Dell? I used to go skating there as a nipper.
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The whole complex that included the skating rink, the TR Suite and car park was within the ground area of the old stadium. Pretty much the only memory left is that one of the roads around there is called Charles Knott Gardens. Charlie Knott being the then owner of Southampton Speedway Club. He sold it all off to developers after Saints won the Championship. The speedway equivalent of the Premier League.
 
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As well as the regular discos, I saw Hawkwind and The Clash at the Top Rank, but not on the same bill!
 
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