This morning we learned that after a period of illness, Martin Dixon sadly passed away. Along with creating Scootermania magazine, Martin was a big part of the scooter scene in the 1970s and 1980s that helped create the rallies and events we enjoy today.
Born in Scarborough Martin grew up with scooters visiting his home town. After buying his first Lambretta in the late 1970s and attending a few rallies he launched a fanzine called Northern Mod Scene to keep the local scooter riders informed about what was going on. He also formed Eastfield Scooter Club based just outside of Scarborough.
That soon became Scootermania, Martin being more of a scooterboy than a Mod. While Norrie Kerr’s Scooter & Scooterist magazine was more along the lines of old school ‘clubman’ type publication, the A5 size Scootermania soon became essential reading for the burgeoning scooterboy (and girl!) scene. Sold by Martin and his scooter clubmates at rallies and shows, it was also available in scooter shops and mod/ music shops around the country. I remember find copies for sale in London’s Carnaby Street as a young teenager.
Martin was instrumental in assembling various people from the scooter scene to co-ordinate the organisation of rallies and events, what would become the Number 1’s Committee, and today is the BSRA. This was in conjunction with organising events and music at rallies, in whatever venue could be found and no matter how much the locals and police protested! As ScooterMania Martin also organised a trip to Holland in 1983. In edition 10 of ScooterNova magazine we interviewed Nick Jolly, co-founder of VFM who recalls the ride, the first of its kind in the scooterboy era, attended by 40 or 50 scooterists.
In edition 37 of ScooterNova we interviewed Lowey, the other co-founder of VFM who also credits Scootermania in the article, such was the magazine’s influence on the scooter scene back then.
In 1984 in the opposite end of the country Stuart Lanning had turned his fanzine, the Somerset Scooterist into a magazine too, that being British Scooterist Scene. But there was an affinity between two scooterists that were producing scooter magazines, as opposed to someone from outside the scene turning up and ‘cashing in’ on the scooterists money.
As Martin said during his interview with Sticky on SLUK when asked about the bigger, nationally distributed magazine launched, “Do you think I couldn’t have competed when Scootering came along if I wanted to? Of course I could, but I’d have to have changed my attitude to life. I’d have to have done something from a purely commercial point of view and that’s not how my life works. You work to live, you don’t live to work.”
Scootermania magazine continued until the mid-80s, evolving from a black and white publication to a glossy colour magazine that was featuring some of the most important custom scooters of the period. The radical chopper Sheer Havoc we featured in edition 49 of ScooterNova magazine first appeared in Scootermania when local scooterist Leo first built it, and was a scooter that Martin still remember all these year later.
Following an injury sustained playing rugby, Martin drifted away from the scooter scene, eventually moving to eastern Europe where he continued to be involved with independent magazine publishing. He returned to the UK and Scarborough a few years ago and attended a few national scooter rallies in his home town among others. But sadly, his health was suffering and eventually Martin succumbed to illness.
Our thoughts and condolences go out to his family and friends as this sad time as we thank Martin Dixon for his contribution to the British scooter scene. RIP Martin.
