Rivista Mensile del Touring Club Italiano, Vol 10, No 3
Articles in this issue
- Notice that from 1 March 1904 the Touring will collect unpaid annual subscriptions by postal draft delivered to members' homes — L. 6.20 for Milan members, L. 6.55 for the rest of Italy, L. 8.55 abroad. Members are urged instead to remit directly to the head office at piazza Durini 7, Milan, by cartolina-vaglia, in exchange for the violet 1904 sticker for their membership card.
- Reports that nearly a thousand members have taken up the five-year subscription (L. 30 inland, L. 40 abroad), which carries a free silver badge. Members who have already paid for 1904 can convert for L. 24 or L. 32.
- Convocation of the ordinary general meeting for Sunday 10 April 1904 at 15.00 in the Borsa hall, piazza Cordusio, Milan, with the full agenda: the auditors' report on the 1903 accounts and the election of eleven councillors replacing Agrati, Barutta, Gavazzi, Gorla, Johnson, Moro, Fumagalli, Badini, Guastalla, Pressi and Silvestri, plus three auditors. Signed by director-general Federico Johnson and council secretary Innocenzo Vigliardi-Paravia.
- The auditors' report on the 1903 accounts, explaining why the separate administrative and patrimonial statements of the previous year have been merged into one. Net capital of L. 223,350.12 is split between the accumulated revenue surplus and the ring-fenced life-member subscriptions (L. 55,700), which are an untouchable commitment to that class of member.
- The double-page balance sheet at 31 December 1903. Assets include L. 10,000 of Italian 5% Rendita and sixty Ferrovie Meridionali bonds at market price, cash, furniture, stock of guides, maps, profiles and monographs, the stereotype plates of the Guida della Campania, badges and the repair boxes and road signs in store; liabilities cover subscriptions paid in advance for 1904-1906, Rivista subscriptions and earmarked funds for road maintenance, the library and the 1906 Milan exhibition share.
- Closing-day report from Turin's first exhibition devoted solely to motor cars and allied trades, conceived by Nino G. Caimi after the 1902 Paris Salon and backed by the Stampa Sportiva and the Club Automobilisti d'Italia under conte Emanuele Cacherano di Bricherasio: over 50,000 visitors, exhibits worth more than L. 1,200,000, over a million lire of business and L. 10,000 set aside for a 1905 Salon. It also records three congresses — of manufacturers, of motorists and of the automobile clubs with the Touring, which founded the Unione Automobilistica Italiana — and lectures by capt. Giulio Doubet, ing. Tedeschi, capt. Cantono, capt. Frassinetti and avv. Goria-Gatti.
- Ing. Effren Magrini's technical survey of the Turin show arranged by product category rather than by stand. Cars covered include Fiat's 1904 chassis, Isotta Fraschini, Dobelli, G. G. Fratelli Ceirano, Darracq, Peugeot and Hurtu; motorcycles include Wanderer, Moto-Cardan, Motosacoche, Zédél, N.S.U. and the Bohemian Republik by Laurin & Klement; then motor launches with Lozier and Fiat engines, accessories (Pirelli, Continental, Michelin, Dunlop and Clément tyres, Reina e Zanardini lamps, Reinach's Oleoblitz oil, the Diamant gearbox and Mutuel engines) and the aeronautical section with the Vassallo, Giuliani and Pacini designs and Frassinetti's dirigible.
- Reprinted from the Gazzetta dello Sport, a description of the Touring's stand no. 63 at Turin: three large paintings by Magni summarising the club's programme, specimen road signs and the plaques marking affiliated doctors, pharmacists, hotels, mechanics and petrol depots, Bertarelli's guides and maps, and a run of the Rivista from its modest 1895 format onwards. The Touring thanks florist Giovanni Savio, photographer Bernardo Pasta and capo-console cav. Alfredo Rostain's Turin consulate.
- Announces Bologna's strictly national exhibition of Italian touring material, promoted by the Touring and opening on 15 May in the Montagnola gardens under dott. Olindo Guerrini and principe Astorre Hercolani, with ten sections from motor cars and cycles to alpine and photographic equipment. A second note follows the visitor's route through the provincial exhibition rising around the Brescia castle on the Cidneo hill.
- Prof. Rodolfo Namias explains his improvement to carbon (pigment) paper, announced at the Berlin applied-chemistry congress: adding 2-3% sodium citrate to the potassium bichromate sensitising bath, a method confirmed by Bennett of London. He also covers the Neue Photographische Gesellschaft's celluloid pigment film, Lumière's crisosolfito for developing in daylight, and the Vidil clamp stand that lets a touring photographer fix a camera to a stick, chair or bicycle.
- An open letter from L. V. Bertarelli arguing that the Associazione Nazionale pel Movimento dei Forestieri should tackle Sicily: strongly differential rail fares from northern Italy, a Genoa-Naples steamer connecting with the Naples-Palermo service, and decent hotels beyond Taormina, the island's one exception. Shorter notes follow on the association's Rome council meeting, the Pro Iseo and Pro Trasimeno committees, the Bologna foreigners' committee under Touring consul Carlo Sandoni, and the new garage at the Hôtel du Nord in Turin.
- New subscriptions to the Touring's road-sign fund from comm. Giovanni Silvestri, cav. L. V. Bertarelli, the Cartiera Vonwiller of Romagnano Sesia, ing. Arturo Ceriana and F.lli Marchand of Piacenza among others, bringing the total to L. 9,700 for 815 signs. It also notes that the Allgemeine Automobil Zeitung of Vienna reproduced the T.C.I. signs as a model, and quotes the Stampa Sportiva's appeal for further donations.
- Railway news: the inauguration of the Varese-Ghirla electric line on 3 February with the mayors of the Val Ganna and Val Marchirolo; Swiss argument over a new eastern Alpine tunnel at the Splügen or the Greina; conte Gian Giacomo Felissent's interprovincial electric tramway scheme for Treviso, Padua and Venice; Angelo Serafini's pamphlet for the Belluno-Cadore line; and a three-month trial of Purrey railcars on the Roma-Viterbo.
- Alpine notes: the Escursionisti Milanesi's carnival outing of 146 people to the Hotel Monte Barro above Galbiate; the transfer of the Società Alpinisti Tridentini presidency from Touring capo-console rag. Guido Larcher at Trento to dott. Carlo Candelpergher at Rovereto for 1904-1905; rag. Mario Tedeschi's seven Umanitaria lectures on alpinism; the Ski-Club di Torino's national ski meeting at Oulx on 19-20 March for the Colle di Sestrières and Monte Fraiteve; and the new Trento society Rododendro.
- Report of the 13 February assembly at Turin where the Club Automobilisti d'Italia and the automobile clubs of Florence, Genoa, Milan and Padua joined the Touring to refound the Italian federation as the Unione Automobilistica Italiana, with comm. Federico Johnson as provisional president and a L. 300 club subscription. Also the convocation of minister Tedesco's commission on motor-car regulations, and the itinerary of La France Automobile's Nizza-Roma touring contest of 18-25 April.
- Cycling notes: the globe-trotter M. Baecker of Biella passed through Milan having already ridden Genoa, Marseilles, Lyon, Geneva, Paris, London, Rotterdam, Cologne, Rome, Hamburg and Berlin, and is bound for Egypt and the St. Louis exposition. A correction follows on the origin of the Audax timed endurance marches, crediting cav. Vito Pardo's Roma-Napoli ride and the September 1897 Torino-Bologna.
- Aeronautical notes: the new Milan air-navigation cooperative formed around capt. Romeo Frassinetti's prize-winning dirigible, with the duca di Genova, ministers Pedotti and Rava and Touring director-general Johnson among its shareholders; the Spanish engineer De Urruela's planned Paris-Madrid flight; the Wright brothers' quarter-mile flights at Kitty Hawk; the 750,000 francs of aeronautic prizes at St. Louis; and Godard's new 1,850-cubic-metre airship with a 50 hp motor.
- A circular to the consuls explaining why the Council wants Touring meets held separately from those of the Audax, whose programme of 200 km endurance marches selects the strongest riders while the Touring's is broadly touristic. Announcements follow of the Cagliari congress on 30 April-2 May with the Sant'Efisio festivities, the La Spezia meet for the launch of the Regina Elena, the Rome consulate's Montenegro trip, and the international cycle-and-motor meet at Genoa on 22-23 May.
- New clubs and their greetings: the Magyar Touring Club founded at Budapest and seeking friendly relations with the T.C.I., a sporting club at Massaua under Ugo Rossi, the Pro Salute society in via Francesco Sforza, Milan, and the Club Sportivo Vittorio at Vittorio (Treviso).
- Book notices on Amato Amati's Confini e toponomastica della Venezia Giulia and the proposed corographic dictionary of the Venezie, P. Stoppani's Come d'autunno with its Spielberg and Monte Rosa chapters, two manuals by prof. Rodolfo Namias, and the San Francisco guide-almanac L'Italia; followed by lists of periodicals received and of newly published books, including Annibale Emilio Angherà's Il ciclismo nella difesa nazionale.
- Legal department opening with Giudicati turistici: a Court of Cassation ruling (Buldrini, Bologna) that a man wheeling an unusable bicycle by hand cannot be fined for lacking the tax plate, and a Milan judgment absolving ing. Attilio Bossi of his chauffeur's speeding offence since, being absent, he could not have prevented it. The Posta legale replies then cover dangerous riding under art. 46 and the Valdagno council's blanket ban on motorcycles, held to contradict the national regulation.
- Illustrated notes on the sites of the season's exhibitions: Bologna's Montagnola, formed from the rubble of the five castles the Bolognesi destroyed between 1334 and 1511 and laid out as a public walk with Diego Sarti's fountain; the Brescia castle on the Cidneo hill, held by Venice from Carmagnola's victory at Maclodio until 1797 and bombarded by Haynau in 1849; and the Saronno sanctuary, whose Gaudenzio Ferrari cupola frescoes are deteriorating and for which sottoprefetto conte Enrico Scapinelli has opened a public restoration subscription.
- Council business under Deliberazioni del Consiglio: a telegram to finance minister Luzzatti opposing any increase in the bicycle tax even in exchange for the movable plate the Touring itself proposed, and his reply; ratification of the Touring's contribution to and office for the new Unione Automobilistica Italiana; the decision to mark the club's tenth anniversary on 8 November 1904 with the opening of the new premises in via Monte Napoleone; and customs-transit relief for members resident abroad.
- Announces that the Guida della Lombardia is nearly printed at about 1,100 pages, with the first two of six topographic map sheets already off the Istituto Geografico Militare presses and covers designed by Alfredo Montalti symbolising Lombard industry, art and irrigated agriculture. Pre-publication prices are L. 5 post free in Italy, L. 5.30 registered and L. 6.20 abroad.
- Thirteenth list of Touring consuls for the 1903-1904 biennium, in addition to those reconfirmed: new representatives at Assisi, Castiadas, Ceneselli, Crema, Ficarolo, Lecce, Porto S. Giorgio, Rimini, Sale, S. Maurizio, Seneghe, Siena, Tolmezzo and Vittorio Veneto, plus Carlo Visintini at Pinguente abroad.
- Fourteenth list of Touring doctors for 1903-1904, adding practitioners at Castiadas, Cortemilia, Erbusco, Gavirate, Quinto al Mare, Soresina, Spezia and Vercelli, together with four newly affiliated pharmacists at Alessandria, Cologna Veneta, Fiorenzuola d'Arda and Gargnano.
- Legal advisers appointed for the 1903-1904 biennium: avv. Pietro Gavini at Cremona, avv. Renato Piani at Gallarate, avv. Guido Nencioni at Pian de' Giullari and avv. Augusto Vianello at Rome.
- Eleventh list of affiliated repairers, second category: Nosenzo Giuseppe e figli at Asti, Airoldi G. Angelo at Borgomanero, Bellini Nino at Casalpusterlengo, the Ditta Stroili at Tolmezzo and Brachetti Benedetto at Viterbo.
- Sixteenth list of affiliated hotels with their category, room and meal tariffs and the standard 10 per cent discount: the Grand Mogol at Alessandria, the Leon d'Oro at Chiari, three houses at Riva di Trento and one at Rovereto, and the Hôtel du Nord at Turin with its special garage. Also recorded are the renaming of the Albergo Montresor at Peschiera and the replacement of the Pension de Londres at Pisa by the Hôtel Nettuno.
- Third and fourth lists of five-year members, continuing from the February issue and running from Scalaffi Arrigo of Milan to Zunini prof. Luigi, with totals of 808 at 15 January and 976 at 15 February 1904.
- Register of benefactor members at Biasca, Biella, Cervia, Genova, Massa Marittima, Milano, Palermo, Potenza, Roma, S. Pietro Seveso, Sassari, Trani and Vigevano, bringing the total to 654 at 15 February 1904.
- Obituary of avv. Guido Pepi, a valued Touring consul, who died young at Florence after a short and violent illness.
- Roll of candidates who applied for membership between 15 January and 15 February 1904, listing life members from Bergamo to Torino — including the Deputazione Provinciale of Perugia and Paul Dewing of New York — followed by annual members arranged province by province from Alessandria onwards.