This will tug at the heart of my generation of fans .

[graingrover]

In the 1950’s and early 60’s I would rush from Belle Vue after the match and take the tennis ball out of my pocket and run up the grass verges on the long avenue up to the bus terminuses at Christ Church .I would pretend I was Tindill or Jeffrey depending on who had scored that day .
Incredible as it might seem but the newspaper man ,dear old Les ,a blind gentleman would already be selling the Football Green Un with the full day’s results at barely 5.30 pm on the corner at Christ Church .It tugs at my heart strings to clearly see him in this old photo .

[The Beast]

In the 1950’s and early 60’s I would rush from Belle Vue after the match and take the tennis ball out of my pocket and run up the grass verges on the long avenue up to the bus terminuses at Christ Church .I would pretend I was Tindill or Jeffrey depending on who had scored that day .
Incredible as it might seem but the newspaper man ,dear old Les ,a blind gentleman would already be selling the Football Green Un with the full day’s results at barely 5.30 pm on the corner at Christ Church .It tugs at my heart strings to clearly see him in this old photo .

Absolutely brilliant, love that photo!

[drfchound]

Crikey grainge, I started doing the same thing in the early to mid sixties.
That picture brings back a ton of memories.

[Glyn_Wigley]

Just down from the pub we used to have in the 60s, the Horse & Groom on East Laithe Gate.

[rover-n-out]

Eeeh, look at that Reliance bus just setting off on it's journey to Stainy and Dunscroft (where I originate). Always remember when the bus left Barnby Dun for Stainy and got to the railway, the bus used to go underneath a bridge that carried the railway over it. We used to get upstairs on the bus, front seats, and my mam would always say to me and my brothers, "quick, duck your heads down when we go under the bridge", used to get us every time with that. Great photo, thanks for posting.

[Avsuptem]

Lovely picture !

I reckon I have probably ridden on that very same bus depicted. Those buses used to have a sign saying 'Dogs not allowed on seats' but we used to cover some of the lettering with our paper tickets so that it read 'Dogs we on seats'

[Donnywolf]

Eeeh, look at that Reliance bus just setting off on it's journey to Stainy and Dunscroft (where I originate). Always remember when the bus left Barnby Dun for Stainy and got to the railway, the bus used to go underneath a bridge that carried the railway over it. We used to get upstairs on the bus, front seats, and my mam would always say to me and my brothers, "quick, duck your heads down when we go under the bridge", used to get us every time with that. Great photo, thanks for posting.

Then things improved with this ...Rovers Express !
rover-n-out did you mean Railway bridge at Kirk Sandall on way to Donny - where road dips under [near what was Rockware] ?

[Donnywolf]

.... and each had these in window

[graingrover]

The Dunscroft Rovers` special used to start on Broadway Avenue opposite the pub. There would always be an advertising sticker on all Reliance, Blue Line, Felix, and Cressey buses, front window behind the driver's seat, to advertise the following Rovers` home game. Those days were before replica shirts, and for kids, the colors were represented on a red and white scarf and painted wooden rattle. Often kids would wear a supporters club metal insignia with a string of bars, each bar representing a season of support.

[The Beast]

An era when people used to actually walk to a bus stop, carry their shopping and talk to each other on the bus. Now people are in their bubble, spend their Saturday trying to get in and out of a retail park before queuing to go through a drive-thru to eat some food with no nutritional value. Going to watch Rovers would be too much like hard work for most, they’ll watch their beloved United/City/Pool on Sunday while eating a dinner that could feed Armthorpe twice over.

[Filo]

The Dunscroft Rovers` special used to start on Broadway Avenue opposite the pub. There would always be an advertising sticker on all Reliance, Blue Line, Felix, and Cressey buses, front window behind the driver's seat, to advertise the following Rovers` home game. Those days were before replica shirts, and for kids, the colors were represented on a red and white scarf and painted wooden rattle. Often kids would wear a supporters club metal insignia with a string of bars, each bar representing a season of support.

I’m sure it started at Ingram Road just off Broadway, went through Stainforth, and Barnby Dun

[graingrover]

I have often argued that the North-south divide was not part of our vocabulary in those days . The fact that in the Second Division we attracted 20,000 fans to Belle Vue was more to do with full employment and good wages all around us . In addition to the mining villages teeming with workmen 24 hours a day in three shifts we had, Doncaster PLant works making engines such as Mallard and the Flying Scotsman .InternationalHarvesters making tractors and combine harvesters.Ford Motor Company, Pilkingtons glassworks, Rockware bottles, British Nylon spinners, British Ropes, ICI, Peglers, et al. A thriving working-class town. Those heavy industry jobs were lost in the wake of the closure of our pits and were never replaced although now there are some promising signs of new business in and around the region which will help improve attendances.
I have lived abroad since 1967 and Rovers has always been my link to my adolescent days in and around Donny,so forgive any nostalgic tones to these posts of mine.

[andy didcott]

That’s a great photo.

[Juddy]

My dad drove the rovers special many times although he could get in free with his bus drivers badge he would stop on the bus reading the paper or get his head down on the back seat ! He would always have the bus ticking over for ten mins or so before full time and get the heating on for the returning passengers in winter

[Colin C No.3]

Nice memories.

We all have them, they make us part of the ‘Rovers Family’.

Mine was walking across what we called ‘the top fields’ in Wheatley Hills coming out just below The Benbow Inn & then walking on to the ground.

I left Donny in 1972 so the route & road names evade my memory, but it must have been a good 4 mile or so to Belle Vue. Walking was never a ‘problem’ in the sixties, especially when you had a game to look forward to at the end of it & one to talk about with your mates or even just me & my brother on the way home with said tennis ball coming out of pocket!

[Donnywolf]

My dad drove the rovers special many times although he could get in free with his bus drivers badge he would stop on the bus reading the paper or get his head down on the back seat ! He would always have the bus ticking over for ten mins or so before full time and get the heating on for the returning passengers in winter

He must have taken me many times.

This is an article I wrote [on favourite memorabilia] for The Pop Side fanzine. I wrote about the Poster above but it is an homage to"Rovers Express" and the good old days

                              ===========================================

Compared to Copps’s 500th Shirt my “Poster” (pictured) pales into insignificance. Tatty and worth nowt it’s nevertheless priceless to me providing a link to my Rovers supporting past – my Dad – and a Supporters life so different it is hard to believe it is barely 45 years ago

In “those days” of no PC’s/Social media, no Mobile Phones/Teletext, the information on when “we” were at home next came via Saturdays Green Un, Programmes, your mates at School or work mates where “most” seemed interested, making for big Gates. Another way was Posters like this simply stuck on the windows of Rovers Express Buses.

Rovers Expresses ran from most areas around Donny and “mine” were double decker Blue Line Buses from Dunscroft via Stainy. They were for people without Cars or kids whose Dads worked shifts. They were cheap and great, picking you up on the Bus route at a constant time before KO so whatever day/time KO was you knew when it would appear. Sometimes it sailed past full and you instinctively knew another would be added and they never failed – taking you straight to Belle Vue.

Usually full of Pit Moggies (an endearing nickname), their kids and Smoke as it was allowed back then, the Buses were a hive of discussion and suppressed excitement. In those days you did not have or need a Forum – you just got on the Express and listened throughout the journey. Would we get there for KO? Would we win? What would the Team be? Who was dropped/injured or even signed? Unlike now you just did not know till you got a Programme and listened for the Team changes.

The Buses had no back doors so it seemed cold any time of year and often condensation rolled down the windows. At the end of the Game you ran full speed to get your preferred seat but if Rovers were losing badly the Express offered sanctuary from “further punishment” and many a time you were on there early with many others BUT bizarrely everyone was on the top-deck trying to see over the wall, watching and hoping for an unlikely comeback.

Then it was home, discussions in full flow whether you’d won or lost and you said “see you next game” to the people in your “club” as you disembarked and if the windows were wet you could leave with next weeks Poster even when 21 years old !

[ravenrover]

Always walked to Belle Vue from Northern Bus station and back. Sometimes on a night game we might run to catch one of the line of buses parked outside Horse Sales, back into town

[EasyforDennis]

Living in Cantley we would walk to Cantley bridge and then down to the garage at which point we would cut across on the pathway between the airport and Bawtry road. Once we got the kop end it was often a case of looking who was around and then climbing over the wall and after jumping down into the gents bogs walk out all innocent.

[Colin C No.3]

Living in Cantley we would walk to Cantley bridge and then down to the garage at which point we would cut across on the pathway between the airport and Bawtry road. Once we got the kop end it was often a case of looking who was around and then climbing over the wall and after jumping down into the gents bogs walk out all innocent.

Thus robbing ‘your club’ of revenue.

[EasyforDennis]

Living in Cantley we would walk to Cantley bridge and then down to the garage at which point we would cut across on the pathway between the airport and Bawtry road. Once we got the kop end it was often a case of looking who was around and then climbing over the wall and after jumping down into the gents bogs walk out all innocent.

Thus robbing ‘your club’ of revenue.

As a ten year old in 1959 yes I retrospectively plead guilty. Can the fact I occasionally nicked sweets from Woolworths pic and and mix also be taken into consideration. At that age the thought of robbing my club of revenue never enter our heads. I guess you was the perfect little swot when you was young and never did anything wrong..

[Filo]

Living in Cantley we would walk to Cantley bridge and then down to the garage at which point we would cut across on the pathway between the airport and Bawtry road. Once we got the kop end it was often a case of looking who was around and then climbing over the wall and after jumping down into the gents bogs walk out all innocent.

Thus robbing ‘your club’ of revenue.

As a ten year old in 1959 yes I retrospectively plead guilty. Can the fact I occasionally nicked sweets from Woolworths pic and and mix also be taken into consideration. At that age the thought of robbing my club of revenue never enter our heads. I guess you was the perfect little swot when you was young and never did anything wrong..

Now we know why Woolworths is no more Lol!

[phil old leake]

Good memories of going to watch the mighty rovers

Used to go into town from Cantley on the bus.  I think it was 7p spend time hanging around the Arndsle centre and then walk to Belle Vue
Spent hours in Foxes records and just standing looking over the balcony being moved on constantly. That would have been 1974/5 ish I was 14

Always galled me as a lad seeing all the buses full of Doncaster people on buses going to Leeds from Waterdale
After the game we often walked home and never thought anything of it

[Filo]

I remember two lads running to catch the coach to an away game at Waterdale, can’t remember the away game, but anyway the coaches to Leeds and Man utd from Donny picked up at Waterdale as well, these two lads jumped on our coach plonked themselves on the first seats at the front and only realised when we got close to the motorway that they had jumped on a Rovers coach and not the Man Utd coach, they got off, I wonder if they made the Man Utd game

[Bessie Red]

Great photo and that corner still looks the same all these years later.

[BiargeBob]

Living in Cantley we would walk to Cantley bridge and then down to the garage at which point we would cut across on the pathway between the airport and Bawtry road. Once we got the kop end it was often a case of looking who was around and then climbing over the wall and after jumping down into the gents bogs walk out all innocent.

Thus robbing ‘your club’ of revenue.

As a ten year old in 1959 yes I retrospectively plead guilty. Can the fact I occasionally nicked sweets from Woolworths pic and and mix also be taken into consideration. At that age the thought of robbing my club of revenue never enter our heads. I guess you was the perfect little swot when you was young and never did anything wrong..

I was the same Dennis, I have more than made up for the loss in revenue over the last 60 plus years.

[Campsall rover]

In the 1950’s and early 60’s I would rush from Belle Vue after the match and take the tennis ball out of my pocket and run up the grass verges on the long avenue up to the bus terminuses at Christ Church .I would pretend I was Tindill or Jeffrey depending on who had scored that day .
Incredible as it might seem but the newspaper man ,dear old Les ,a blind gentleman would already be selling the Football Green Un with the full day’s results at barely 5.30 pm on the corner at Christ Church .It tugs at my heart strings to clearly see him in this old photo .

Great photo.

[ForsolongaRover]

I am trying to work out which is the “long avenue”, possibly Town Moor Avenue? Looking at the map today, I realised that my walking routes were not always the shortest, but then, as a child, speed was never a priority.

Town Moor Ave was on my route from Wheatley to watch Rovers with my junior school mate, Dougie. I too remember the bars on the Supporters Club badge. We used to go to Reserves matches too and if you were a member of the Supporters Club and showed your card it was at a reduced price, possibly free since I think it was less that a shilling for kids for first team games in the late 40s. The only reserve team members I can remember were Charlie Wakeman, the more or less permanent reserve goalkeeper when Ken Hardwick was first choice. And one other called Dubois (“Dewboys” to us!) a winger, who was in and out of the first team and also an occasional NI international who took penalties just like Peter Doherty - who never seemed to miss.

Back then, the team was often as printed in the programme, but later when I was older and working we would nip out of the office in the late afternoon to see Saturday’s team which would be in Friday’s evening paper.

[Wiltshire Exile]

Just down from the pub we used to have in the 60s, the Horse & Groom on East Laithe Gate.

East Laithe Gate? Wasn’t that where Ray Harrison, a Rovers’ player from the 50’s/60’s, had a sports shop? I well remember buying my first referee’s uniform from that shop!

[EasyforDennis]

Just down from the pub we used to have in the 60s, the Horse & Groom on East Laithe Gate.

East Laithe Gate? Wasn’t that where Ray Harrison, a Rovers’ player from the 50’s/60’s, had a sports shop? I well remember buying my first referee’s uniform from that shop!

And latterly owned by Hubert Bates.

[ForsolongaRover]

His shop would be visible from the driver’s side of the bus. It was right at the top of E Laithe Gate and from it you would look down the left-hand fork of Thorne Road where the bus stops for Hatfield etc., were. Perhaps they still start from there…