CTC Gazette, Vol 1914, No 1
Articles in this issue
- Reviews the newly published Conference of Road Users report and the record-breaking C.T.C. stand at the Olympia Cycle Show, notes the Amateur Camping Club concession has been withdrawn, and reports nearly 27,000 signatures gathered for the Manchester District Association's petition over the Moss Side fatality inquest.
- The retiring Editor bids members a wry farewell after more than six years in the chair as he hands over to the incoming Secretary-Editor and departs on a three-month Mediterranean tandem tour; the same page carries a long note on the Auto-Wheel motor attachment, quoting a reader's account of a chain fault after 300 trouble-free miles and a Brooklands hill-climb trial.
- Barristers E. G. Hemmerde, K.C., and Harold Brandon give the Rights and Privileges Committee their opinion on two cycling-fatality inquests, rebutting the Manchester City Coroner's direction that cyclists without rear lights invite blame while upholding Mr Justice Bankes' Oakmere ruling as correct on its facts.
- Minutes of the joint C.T.C./N.C.U.-convened Conference of Road Users, chaired by Sir George Gibb with Dr E. B. Turner leading the General Committee, set out 26 resolutions on highway law, lighting and overtaking rules, with the C.T.C. and N.C.U. formally dissenting from the resolution on compulsory rear lights for cycles.
- A technical column rebuts Mr J. I. Rodway's defence of the Rodess automatic tyre-inflator shown at Olympia, debates Vernon Blake's finger-shifted lever-gear system, and answers a query on fitting variable multi-sprocket gears to tricycles.
- Mabel Richards laments the neglected, rusting state of many women's bicycles seen about in winter, gives practical chain-cleaning advice for machines without oil-bath gearcases, and criticises parents who let children ride ill-adjusted adult-sized bicycles to school.
- Lists January lighting-up times and cheap winter-sports rail fares to Chamonix and Mont Revard, prints hotel recommendations from Newcastle (Co. Down) to Cushendall and Larne, touring queries about Sicily and Nice, and short 'Prospective Tours' notices including a Bristol winter-runs invitation and a Holland canal-skating party.
- A winter-photography instalment giving exposure times for snow and sports scenes, advice on screens and plates for use in England versus Switzerland, and warnings against flat, contrast-less snow foregrounds.
- J. H. tours England's surviving village lock-ups, including Castle Cary's 'round-house', the six-sided Dunchurch cage, Looe's tiny prison inscribed 'For Evil Doers', the Lingfield Cage, Swanage's lock-up, and the disused 'State Prison' on Sark.
- A. W. Rumney opens a comic account of preparing to cycle from Dan to Beersheba in Palestine, describing a phonetic phrase-book from a college friend and a Church Missionary Society contact, then training through Provence via Marseilles, Martigues, Arles and Nimes.
- 'A. I.' recounts a 516-mile day-by-day tour of the Auvergne covering Clermont-Ferrand, the Puy de Dome, Mont-Dore, the road tunnel at Le Lioran, the Gorges du Tarn and Mont Aigoual, with fares, guidebooks and map recommendations for other members.
- Charles H. Booth describes a 1,151-mile tour with a friend from Algiers through Kabylia, Constantine and Timgad to Biskra and Kairouan, and on into Tunis, noting the Roman ruins at Timgad and Dougga and the hot springs at Hammam Meskoutine.
- Three C.T.C. members cycle from Zurich over the Arlberg and Brenner passes into the Dolomites, cross the Stelvio Pass into Italy to Bormio, and return home via Lake Como, with a postscript by 'E. J. B.' praising the C.T.C. Alpine Profile Road Book.
- Douglas Leechman, M.I.A.E., concludes his Olympia Show report on motor-cycles, detailing the Levis two-stroke, the A.J.S., the Blackburne's outside flywheel, and Rudge-Whitworth's belt-tensioning device, and reviews the new edition of 'The Motor-Cyclists' Handbook'.
- Reader letters cover recruiting new members via the Club disc, a running debate on lever-driven versus rotary cycle propulsion between S. O'Dwyer, G. Lacy Hillier and Vernon Blake, rim brakes versus coaster hubs, the Rodess inflator, an Australian member's plan to cycle round the world, and a plea for thatched-roof preservation.
- Formal notices cover the annual subscription renewal (given in French and German as well as English), a Council vacancy in Division VI (Cheshire, Shropshire and Stafford), counties needing Chief Consuls, and the terms of the C.T.C.'s cycle and motor-cycle insurance schemes.
- Minutes of the December Council meeting record its view that the Conference of Road Users' resolutions fail to remedy dangerous motoring speeds, its continued resistance to compulsory rear-lighting of cycles, a protest to Kent County Council over its refusal of a 10 m.p.h. limit at Dunton Green, and praise for the Manchester Guardian's stance on the Moss Side fatality.
- Committee notes and run listings from C.T.C. districts nationwide, including Birmingham & Midland's annual dinner, Bristol & Gloucestershire's membership figures, Manchester's report on the 27,000-signature Moss Side petition, and detailed Saturday and Sunday run schedules for the Metropolitan Association's several sections.