The following pages, under the heading The Dave deLapp `Stevens Register`, are the result of many years of hard work, persistence and dedication on the part of their author. We are fortunate, and very grateful, that he has allowed us to use them here.

The Lambretta was a great bike to learn on and was loads of fun around town. But the 50-mile trip down the old coast road became an embarrassment when overtaken by my smart alec mates on Honda 250’s; Suzuki Hustlers and YD Yamahas (they weren’t scooters).
At 17yrs of age, with a brand new license and three hundred dollars in my wallet, I went hunting for a real bike. 650 Trumpys were about $600 and good BSA’s were hard to find. For some reason I ended up with a 5 yr old ex-police Matchy in good mechanical order, but with a shocking paint job, a faded yellow and red metal flake machine still running on sidecar gearing. Boy could this machine take off at a set of lights, many  times with the front wheel off the ground.
That did it for me …I was hooked….a true motorcycle junkie. I bought all the magazines and joined a couple of bike clubs. Took on the job of librarian, where I was introduced to the A to Z of unique marques from all over the world. My imagination was filled with strange sounding machinery from exotic places. There was the Kreidler from Germany, the Husqvarna from Sweden, the Sarolea from Belgium, not to mention the fantastic array of machines from the UK, like the Hesketh, Pendine Brough, Sunbeam and AJS (just to name a few). With such knowledge at my fingertips, I was constantly approached by fellow enthusiasts for information on all sorts of bikes and there starts my grounding as a marque specialist.
The job of librarian was passed on so I could take up the challenge of President of the Classic club. About this time, I had a phone call from a friend who was after a Classic bike, but had only found an old girder fork model that didn’t suit his needs, he thought I might be interested and believed it was a pre-war AJS. I follow up the lead which took me to a farming area in the western suburbs and sure enough, there stood this bike in an old open shed. It was missing its timing covers and magneto and all electrics, but appeared to be relatively sound (for a paddock basher). Strangely, I could not identify the bike as being an AJS as all markings were missing, except for the engine number, I7735, which didn’t make much sense. I was suspect of the bikes pedigree even though the owner assured me it was a 350 AJS. Intrigued by the unusual position of the oil tank (in front of the engine crankcases) and the large 2” exhaust, I felt that I had to have this bike. Fortunately I was offered the machine at a price I couldn’t refuse, so I struck a deal and the bike was loaded into my Holden Ute.
I was determined to find out as much as I could about this little machine, it didn’t take me long to realize it wasn’t an AJS. But no one could say what it was….an OK supreme ? a Dunelt ? an AKD ? I wrote to Bob Currie at the Classic Motorcycle and he published my letter in the magazine, asking for help…well, I received letters from America, Australia, New Zealand, Europe and the UK….after two years of writing letters backwards and forwards between continents (pre internet days) we decided the bike was a 250 Stevens.
I never had so much difficulty in identifying a single bike before, so in order to ensure no one else had the same difficulty, I decided to put all my letter writing contacts into a register….the Stevens register. My contact details, as curator of the register, was sent to many magazine editors and from there the information trail continued to grow. This was all very exciting and I found the generosity of the Stevens fraternity to be most encouraging. Piecing all the various bits of information together I have been able to form a comprehensive list of year-by-year changes and details of all the Stevens models by year date and by model number code. Not to mention the detailed  history  and insight into the Stevens family life, given to me by Alec and Geoff Stevens (but that’s another story, for another page).

Yours in Motorcycling.

David deLapp

P.S. I’ve still got the Matchy (now fitted with a sporting sidecar) on Historic Classic Club plates.