Cultureshock

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Video transcript

The Blaydon Races –a famous song sang at every single Newcastle United football game. Many of my friends are devoted fans and know the song off-by-heart. However, they never believe my own personal Blaydon Races story.

My great, great, great uncle, Geordie Ridley, wrote the Blaydon races in 1862. The song describes the journey from Bambras in Newcastle to the race course in Blaydon in the same year, the famous year in which the bus broke down.

Here is Geordie in the Blaydon Races portrait painted by William Irving in 1903. He is shown with other characters such as the Chicken of Whickham who is fighting with Scrapper Reed of Winlaton.

My family own the rights to Geordie's grave which is at Sunderland Road graveyard in Gateshead. However, it is very hard to find amongst the thousands of other gravestones.

So maybe now my story will be believed among my friends as I am truly proud of my relation to Geordie Ridley. But perhaps I will still receive "two black eyes and a broken nose" for mentioning it again.