Rivista Mensile del Touring Club Italiano, Vol 15, No 8
Articles in this issue
- L. V. Bertarelli sails from Milazzo through the Aeolian Islands, describing the basalt spires of the Perciato and the Pietralunga off Lipari, the 386-metre Fossa Vecchia crater of Vulcano and the neighbouring Vulcanello, the filthy Albergo Nazione, and the squalid «cameroni» of Lipari's penal colony, where a convict from Bari tells him he must eat on fifty centesimi a day. Continued in the next issue.
- Full-page plate of seven photographs of the Pavia–Mantua motorboat cruise: the royal torpedo boat P. E. 44 moored at Pavia by the Canottieri Ticino chalet, the flag presented to the «Pavia», the boat on the upper Po and on the Mincio below the tower of Governolo, and the arrival at Mantua's Porto Catena.
- Silio Carfani on the mid-August holiday: the tribute extorted from tenants by concierges and postmen, Siena's Palio in the Piazza del Campo, Palermo's viceregal cavalcade and its release of prisoners, the flooding of Rome's Piazza Navona (instituted by Innocent X in 1655, suppressed in 1676 and revived in 1703), and the Milanese besieging the Stazione Centrale for the lakes, with cyclists riding out rather than taking the train.
- Dott. Alessandro Clerici argues that the prejudice in favour of great altitude has unfairly demoted Italy's prealpine lake shores and mid-altitude Apennine stations — San Marcello Pistoiese, Zocca, Nocera Umbra, the Abetone — and recommends the organised air-bath as an artificial stimulant where woodland and water already make the climate exceptionally constant.
- G. C. Abba on the Bergamo valleys: Schilpario and Vilminore in the Val di Scalve, home of Cardinal Angelo Mai and of a volunteer killed on the Gianicolo in 1849; the Dezzo raging through its gorge beside the perilous Via Mala; the fourteenth-century Danza macabra painted on Clusone's Chiesa dei Disciplini; the Serio's 316-metre waterfall in three leaps; and Stoppani's Orobie above the Val Brembana.
- Bertarelli's travel notebook from a bicycle ride between Bagnara and Reggio six months after the Calabrian-Sicilian earthquake: the only north–south provincial road still blocked for a kilometre by an untouched landslide, Scilla passable only in single file, a mummified adolescent left unburied in Reggio's cemetery, and the Pellaro railway bridge girder torn away by the tidal wave, turned a quarter-circle and carried some hundred metres up the dry fiumara.
- The Touring's «per il bosco e per il pascolo» reforestation fund reaches L. 100 400, including L. 4000 from Minister Cocco-Ortu's ministry and subscriptions from senator G. B. Pirelli, Giuseppe Feltrinelli, ing. Alberto Riva and the Bologna consulate; Bertarelli presses consuls for more before the Commission is seated in October or November.
- The season's flying: Latham's failed Channel attempt, which ended 18 km offshore with the cruiser Harpon making the rescue; Bleriot's Prix du Voyage with two passengers and his 45-minute crossing from Sangatte on 25 July; Farman's 1h 23' at Châlons-sur-Marne and Paulhan's climb to 50 metres; and the coming meetings at Reims and the Brescia circuit of 5–20 September on the Montichiari heath, with Faccioli, Miller and Fiam machines against Voisin, Wright, Curtiss and Antoinette.
- Reprinted from Motor, an account of seven New York sportsmen who motor out to shoot in the Manhattan woods and at Barnegat Bay, pitching tents and sleeping on inflatable rubber mattresses — proof, the writer argues, that only the car makes such weekend camping compatible with city business.
- Night photography by arc lamp and incandescent gas needs ten to twenty minutes' exposure, a large-diameter lens in a long hood and a waterproof cover; rain and snow improve the reflections on wet pavements, moving figures leave the streets deserted, development runs over half an hour with the solution changed every five minutes, and Robert Dykes's is said to be the only treatise on the subject.
- The department on tourism in law and statistics for August 1909, opening with Parliament's new act on motor services and penalties and closing with a ministerial ruling on the Sunday opening of bicycle workshops.
- The new act eases the road-maintenance charge borne by concessionaires of public motor services and, after two children were killed by a car in Rome in June and deputy Eugenio Valli's interpellation against «automobilastri», raises speeding fines to L. 100–500 payable jointly by driver and owner and to L. 1000–2000 for manufacturers issuing irregular type-conformity certificates.
- Against the Milan magistrate, who held that fitting spare parts amounted to a prohibited sale, the Ministry of Agriculture and Commerce rules that bicycle repair workshops may open on Sundays because the work is instrumental to the hire trade already exempted by the weekly-rest law.
- Signed «g. t.», a survey of road cross-sections from the Romans' hand-laid stone foundations through Trésaguet, Telford and Mac-Adam to Cassell's tarred and oiled bed of 1834, Stiebel's asphalt, Gladwell's bituminous grouting, Bradshaw's hot granite-asphalt and tarmacadam, with granite or wood-block paving on 15 cm of concrete for town streets.
- Siena's capo-console Giuseppe nob. Camajori reports a new masonry bridge over the torrent Taglia easing communication between the Cassia-Amelia crossroad and Monte Amiata: 169.86 m long, 6.20 m wide between parapets, with ten arches of 13 m chord and 2 m rise and pedestrian refuges on turrets.
- Fifty-two prizes drawn among members who recruit others: an Atala luxury machine, a Bonzi e Marchi «Senior» tourer and a Frera with the new three-speed B.S.A. hub, Pirelli semelles covers, Aquilas lamps, an Auto-Alba camera, Gillette razors and Plasmon boxes, on top of silver and gold medals for ten, fifty and a hundred new adhesions.
- Full-page photographic plate showing the Milan fire brigade's motor appliances in service.
- Books received and noticed, among them Braunwald's Die Haftpflicht für Automobilschäden (Bern, 1909) on the motorist's civil liability, the Corriere fotografico's photographic manuals, Roster's Climatologia dell'Italia, Bassoli's Elementi di aerostatica, aeronautica ed aviazione, Bracke's Les monoplans Bleriot and Drzewiecki on airscrews.
- The volunteer cyclists' national sub-committee, meeting on 25 June 1909 under senator Bettoni, telegraphs thanks to the War Minister for the 150 000 lire entered in the army estimates and recognises new provincial committees at Mantua, Padua, Turin and Udine and local ones at Castelnuovo Veronese, Morbegno, Tortona and Villafranca Veronese.
- Every V. C. A. unit is called to the army's grand manoeuvres in the Veneto at the end of August for the corps' annual demonstration, and committees that have not yet returned their expected numbers are pressed to do so at once so the manoeuvre directorate can arrange services.
- Volunteer motorcyclists are invited to enrol for the manoeuvres on terms of L. 7 a day while the machine stays serviceable plus L. 0.10 a kilometre, petrol and lubricants found; carriage is either by rail with the fare refunded or by road at L. 5 a day, distances reckoned from the Touring's own guides at 150 km a day.
- The motoring sub-committee at the Automobile Club d'Italia in Turin opens enrolment: Italian citizenship, age 21, a car and a driving certificate, a two-year engagement of at most 20 days' service; cars are graded in three classes, first-class owners ranking as officers and the rest as N.C.O.s, with electric vehicles excluded for now.
- The club's official section for August 1909: avv. Belotti is delegated to the Verona meeting called by the Garda section on the italianità of the lake, participation in the Buenos Aires and Brussels exhibitions is sent for study, and prince Prospero Colonna and console cav. Michele Oro will represent the Touring on the «Alla scoperta dell'Abruzzo» motor tour.
- Of 1751 votes counted at the Touring's offices on 30 June 1909, 1745 approved the 1908 accounts and 1689 the statute changes; Binda, Favari, Riva and Zaffaroni were elected councillors for 1909–11 and Magnocavallo, Soffredi and Turrini auditors.
- The signpost department, recording the month's fresh gifts towards the Touring's road signs.
- New signpost donations carry the running total from 3453 signs and L. 51 642.50 to 3604 and L. 54 537.50, the largest coming from the provincial deputations of Catanzaro (48 signs), Lucca (25) and Chieti (16) and from the municipality of Milan (30).
- Two new head consuls appointed: cav. Francesco Luigi Merli at Ascoli Piceno and rag. Armando Pedrini at San Francisco, California.
- New consuls appointed, among them Giacinto Caligari at Chiavenna, Virginio rag. Chieri at Chefoo, Enrico Lehn at Palermo, Fausto conte Parsi at Tripoli di Barberia and cap. Bernardo Faronato as military consul at Florence.
- Eleven doctors added to the club's medical roll, among them Marcello dott. Contegni at Gunardo, Alfonso dott. Cotelessa at Lanciano, Angelo dott. Marsano at Nervi and Giuseppe dott. Maltese at Scicli.
- Five lawyers added to the club's legal roll: avv. Celso Fabbro at Belluno, Antonino avv. Lancieri at Melfi, Umberto avv. Odetti Santini at Rignano sull'Arno, Ettore avv. Gazzone at Scicli and Francesco avv. Poma at Senerchia.
- Candidates who applied for membership between 1 and 31 May 1909, life members first — among them senator prof. Luigi Mangiagalli of Milan, Vittorio Cini of Ferrara, march. Luigi Torrigiani of Florence, the Itala motor works of Turin and the battleship Regina Elena.
- The membership return: 71 128 annual members at 15 June less 106 resigned, untraceable or in default, plus 1152 newly enrolled, giving 72 174 annual members, alongside 2329 life members at the end of 1908 and 485 more taken since 1 January.