THE chance rescue of a penny farthing cycle from a scrapheap over 50 years ago has turned the village of Benson into a Mecca for bicycling enthusiasts.

On Sunday, 245 cyclists from across the world will bring all manner of pre-1926 bikes to take part in the 50th Benson Veteran Cycle Club Rally.

The event was founded in 1960 by the club’s life president Ned Passey, now aged 89, after he saved a penny farthing being thrown out by his father.

Fifty years later, he has built up a personal collection of 450 historic bicycles.

He said: “About two or three years before we started the rally, my father owned a penny farthing and was taking it from his house to the scrapyard.

“It had been stored in an outbuilding, the roof had collapsed, and it was going out with a lot of other stuff as scrap.

“I rescued it, restored it, and rode it in a rally in Ripley (in Derbyshire). My friends wanted to ride as well, so we decided to set a rally up here.”

He added: “It has just gone on and on. I never ever thought it would last for 50 years.”

The first rally attracted 35 riders, but every year since more have joined.

On Sunday, enthusiasts will come from as far as Australia to take part in its 50th ride, some of them riding wooden-framed Velocipedes, which in 1869 became the world’s first bicycle with pedals, soon earning the nickname “boneshakers” because they were so uncomfortable to ride.

Riders will set off from the village’s Sunnyside recreation ground at 10am, for a 13-mile cycle through the villages of Roke, Berrick Salome, Chalgrove and Ewelme.

Mr Passey said: “All of the bikes are done up and are still as good as the day they were manufactured.”

He assembled his own collection over decades, rescuing many from his family’s scrapyard and finding others abandoned in hedgerows.

Once thrown away as worthless scrap, vintage bikes can now fetch thousands of pounds at auction.

The oldest in Mr Passey’s collection is an 1818 ‘hobby horse’, one of the earliest forerunners of the modern bicycle, which was propelled by the rider’s feet on the ground.

His personal favourite is a four-wheeled Willard Sawyer Velocipede, dating from 1851.