Offizielle Festschrift: XII. Congress des Deutschen Touren-Club
Contents
- Opening festival poem welcoming congress delegates to Munich on the Isar, hailing the bicycle ("Stahlross") as a machine that unites continents and thanking the Allgemeine Radfahrer-Union for championing cycle touring; signed Jos. Carl Strasser, 1897.
- Day-by-day festival program for 16-21 July 1897: reception evenings at Hotel Trefler and the Münchener Kindl-Keller, congress deliberations, the Preis-Corso parade past the Residenz to Nymphenburg, an international cycle race at Perlach, an artistic-cycling tournament at the Schleibinger-Bräukeller, a steamer excursion on the Starnberger See, and tours to Herrenchiemsee, Hohenschwangau, Neuschwanstein and the Alps.
- Illustrated history of Munich, signed R.T., tracing the city from its origins as a monastic settlement of Kloster Tegernsee through the Wittelsbach dukes and kings - Ludwig der Bayer, Max I, Ludwig I and Ludwig II - and describing landmark buildings including the Frauenkirche, St. Michael's church, the Theatinerkirche, the Residenz and the Glyptothek.
- History of the Allgemeine Radfahrer-Union, founded 1 January 1886 in Nürnberg, and of its Munich consulate, naming early officials including J. Schäfer, C. M. Herbeck and Rob. Tochtermann sen. and tracing membership growth from about 400 in 1886 to 1,800 by the end of 1896.
- Essay by Prof. Dr. Ad. Banzer on the pleasures and etiquette of cycle touring, covering observation of landscape and geology, moderating speed through villages, greeting locals, avoiding alcohol on tour, correct riding posture and clothing, and touring as a married couple.
- Satirical poem by Hartl-Mitius voiced by a curmudgeon who despises the new cycling craze and longs for the days of the stagecoach, complaining of nearly being run down by cyclists and threatening to flee civilisation altogether.
- Full-page art plate donated to the festschrift by the Munich painter Prof. Otto Seitz, a pen-and-wash caricature of a pipe-smoking man seated at a tavern table, signed and dated 1897.
- Comic letter in Munich dialect by Benno Rauchenegger, written as if from a market-woman, 'Frau Wurzel', describing her adventures learning to cycle, run-ins with police over an unlit lamp and a forbidden path, a collision with a dachshund, and a fall into a pond.
- Comic verse narrative signed Strasser Sepp describing a cycling trip from Perugia through the Abruzzi to the waterfalls at Terni, imagining an ambush by bandits Fra Diavolo, Casparone and Abellino before the party is instead welcomed into a countryman's house for wine and ham.
- Comic story about two Munich burghers, Xaver Dimpfler and Johann Baptist Strobl, whose friendship ends after Strobl borrows Dimpfler's bicycle for a tryst with a barmaid in Grünwald, returns it damaged, and lets Dimpfler take the blame from his wife.
- Bavarian-dialect comic poem by Peter Auzinger about a novice cyclist, Hans, who repeatedly falls off his machine while learning to ride yet boasts afterward as though he were a champion rider.
- Dialect comic poem by Julius Thannhauser about a young woman from Munich's Au district who leaves a burly mason for a fashionable young cyclist, only for her jilted first lover to catch and crush the cyclist's bicycle in revenge.
- Biographical profile with portrait of Major Demetrius Weidner, born in Lindau in 1833, who fought as a pioneer officer at the siege of Paris in 1870-71, later travelled widely as an amateur watercolourist, and was honoured by the Deutscher Touren-Club with its First Class badge as an 'apostle' of cycle touring.
- Illustrated feature by A. Praun depicting a cyclist through the four seasons of the year, continued ("Fortsetzung") on the following page.
- Page of short cycling jokes and cartoon captions, including gags about a hungry child on a bicycle, a flattering suitor, a rider whose machine breaks into a thousand pieces, and a newspaper poll on cycling dress.
- Essay by C. A. Hennig contrasting the slow pace of the past with the accelerating modern age, tracing the succession from stagecoach to railway to bicycle, and describing how women taking up cycling broadened the sport's popular appeal.
- Opening address from the Hauptausschuss (main organising committee) welcoming Union comrades to Munich for the congress, dated 29 May 1897 and signed by chairman R. Tochtermann and the heads of the entertainment, touring, press, finance, sport, lodging and exhibition committees.
- General regulations for congress attendance: the 6-mark festival book (Festbuch) with its admission coupons, ticket prices for individual events, and the full schedule of entitlements it covers, from the reception evening to the Starnberger See excursion.
- Rules for the prize and festival parade (Preis- und Fest-Corso), run in two divisions - Union consulates/clubs, and mixed clubs - with 50 and 10 prizes respectively, specifying gala dress, white gloves, removal of luggage racks and lamps from machines, and a ban on smoking during the procession.
- Competition rules for the artistic cycling tournament, covering the A.R.-U. championships on high-wheel and safety bicycles, group figure-riding (Reigenfahren) and freestyle riding (Kürfahren), with entry fees and prize values listed for each class.
- Table of 15 organised post-congress cycle tours from Munich, with day-counts and distances ranging from a short 80 km loop via Andechs to a 690.5 km, ten-day tour through Garmisch, the Vorarlberg and Lake Constance.
- Prospectus for long-distance (Weitpreis) medals awarded to members riding at least 500 km to the congress, and for silver medals and diplomas for the best written descriptions of touring routes of at least 300 km, signed by sport-committee chairman A. Englhard.