Rickman - MÉTISSE HISTORY

Brothers in Arms

- Alan Cathcart

Métisse motorcycles were created by Derek and Don Rickman, two of Britain’s leading Motocross stars of the 1950s and ‘60s, when it was still known as Scrambles. Successful racers who were also technically gifted, they started building their own frames to resolve the perceived shortcomings of the offroad bikes then available from British firms like Triumph, Matchless and BSA, which then dominated the global dirtbike market. Named Métisse, the French word for a female mongrel as denoting the combination of a proprietary engine in a Rickman frame, their machines earned a worldwide reputation for excellence, with the 2,000 Métisse frames built in the 1960s winning countless races and titles offroad on both sides of the Atlantic, as well as Down Under.

Their father Ernie Rickman was a professional Speedway rider with Southampton Saints, who died in 1948 when elder brother Derek was 15. Their mother Marjorie continued to run the family motorcycle shop in New Milton on the edge of the New Forest, providing enough income to send both brothers away to boarding school in Somerset. Thereafter, Derek began a four-year apprenticeship at Thorneycroft Commercial Vehicles in Basingstoke, as preparation for taking over the family business from his mother.