The Bearings, Vol 12, No 4
Articles in this issue
- Tom Cooper's habit of sprinting three-eighths of a mile from home nets him three wins out of four at Marinette over Bald, Murphy and Cabanne, lifting him to sixth in the percentage table (Bald still first) as Bald rests for Springfield and the circuit finalizes a Canadian loop, a western record-breaking swing, and a big autumn camp at Louisville's Fountain Ferry track.
- Over two days of the Wisconsin Division meet, Cooper and Bliss of the Monarch team sweep the Class B events (L. C. Johnson and Ray MacDonald also setting a tandem quarter-mile record) before Cabanne, coming from behind, beats Bald and Murphy by a foot in the closing mile.
- A fairly run national circuit meet restores Minneapolis's reputation after the prior year's debacle even as poor attendance leaves the Limited Club in debt; A. A. Hansen's bid to break the 100-mile record fails at sixty miles, while Hofer sets a new paced-mile mark of 2:05.
- Topeka's two-day state meet sees Hackett of Olathe win the mile championship in a record 2:16⅑, and on the second day Woodlief lowers the half-mile record to 1:04⅔ while Hayman and Pixley trim a fifth of a second off the state tandem mark.
- An editorial urges the L. A. W. to raise its race-meet sanction fees from $2 to $10 and national circuit dates from $10 to $25, arguing the extra revenue could finally fund sending American amateurs to the international championships.
- The Bearings laments that the United States, having hosted the first world championships at the 1893 Chicago World's Fair, has sent no amateur representative to either meeting since, blaming apathy in the Racing Board chairmanship rather than any lack of talent or funds.
- An editorial extols early autumn as the best touring season and urges cyclists to abandon fixed mileage plans and destinations in favor of leisurely, spontaneous trips with a congenial companion.
- Translated from La Bicyclette, this feature vividly describes the physical torment of a paced twenty-four-hour rider reduced to a machine-like state by exhaustion, and argues such brutalizing contests violate the laws of nature and should be stopped.
- Racing Board chairman George D. Gideon tells a Philadelphia reporter he has no interest in succeeding I. B. Potter as L. A. W. president despite talk of his candidacy, saying his Racing Board post already satisfies him.
- With the Wisconsin state meet concluded, W. A. Brown of the Marinette Bicycle Club is expected to succeed A. Cressy Morrison as chief consul over Dr. D. S. McArthur of La Crosse, and M. C. Rotier looks set to be re-elected secretary-treasurer; the item also notes Tom Winder's 23,000-mile border tour passing through Syracuse, including a night spent treed by bears.
- The Syracuse A. A. will run an August 25 tandem road race organized by Herbert E. Maslin of E. C. Stearns & Co., which donates gold watches as first prizes, with Gardiner set to pace behind the scratch tandem in a bid at the single-wheel record.
- Charles A. Palm wins the Deere & Webber Co.'s twenty-mile Minneapolis road race in 55:38 from the five-minute mark, while scratch men Bird, Mertens, Patterson, Becker, Briggs and Hansen battle for time honors, Bird finishing in a state-record 54:17.
- Short items report Hofer winning two of three races at Independence, Iowa; St. Clair, Michigan's meet won by Moore, Samberg, Burkhart and Morris; Bert Repine sweeping four events at Galesburg, Illinois; and Wisconsin's membership more than doubling from 426 to 940 under Secretary Rotier.
- Racing Board chairman Gideon's weekly rulings list Class B transfers and professional declarations from Bonham, Texas to Toronto, plus suspensions including Harry Miller (one year, for racing under a false name) and several St. Louis and Philadelphia riders barred for unsanctioned Sunday racing.
- Mary E. Brooks of Sioux City, Iowa wins The Bearings' $5 weekly prize paragraph with an essay arguing that cycling-paper advertisements must be varied, brief, pointed and freshly illustrated if they are to keep readers' interest and drive sales.
- Dealer F. Colson of Norwalk, Ohio protests the season's brakeless ladies' machines as reckless given riders' momentum on 66-72 inch gears, citing accidents that a simple brake would have prevented.
- Percy B. Lovell of Moorestown, New Jersey extols unplanned bicycle touring, even a short trip near home, as an inexpensive and educational pleasure requiring little more than a bicycle, a grip of clothing and a companion of similar riding ability.
- Writing as "Barry Hecla," the author condemns organized women's bicycle races being promoted in the east as a degrading sideshow that no true lover of honest sport should encourage.
- The Bearings restates its two standing competitions: $50 in weekly $5 paragraph prizes running through the autumn, and a $50 prize for the best essay on selling bicycles on the road, closing August 30, 1895, with full manuscript-submission rules.
- Mason City, Illinois's Bicycle Association meet results list Peter Jones winning the six-mile handicap, G. T. McCarthy the six-county mile championship, and L. H. Wykoff taking both the mile and five-mile handicaps.
- Fred Stobbard lowers the Elgin-Aurora century record to 5:53:18⅖ and William Becker breaks the unpaced mark days later; Eva Mae Christen becomes the first bride married in bloomers; the Lincoln Cycling Club announces the country's first twelve-hour road race; and eleven separate road races, including the Illinois Cycling Club's 117-man event, are run across the city in a single Saturday.
- Louis Gimm of the C. W. C. rides 452 miles 1,715 yards at Cleveland's Glenville track to break Twyman's twenty-four-hour paced record by more than 45 miles, dismounting only four times in an actual riding time of 22:46:00.
- At Syracuse, novice rider Arthur Baker of Baldwinsville wins the Century Cycling Club's ten-mile handicap over the Cicero plank road from the 1:30 mark, lowering the record to 27:02, a result under protest for insufficient checkers at the turn.
- A purely professional meet at New York's Manhattan Beach track draws only a few hundred spectators; Walter Sanger wins a re-run half-mile, Jay Eaton the mile handicap, and Harry Tyler the final mile after breaking his chain in an earlier heat.
- San Francisco loses its only cement track to demolition, but backers claim $35,000 is already raised for a new three-lap track near San Mateo, though many racing men remain skeptical the proposed Pacific Cyclist circuit will come off.
- A London dispatch covers the Cyclists' Touring Club's tenth congress at Tunbridge Wells, including visits to Groombridge House and Eridge Castle and a reception by the mayor, plus a tamely attended Sport and Play twenty-four-hour race with only nine starters.
- At Cologne, American George Banker's disputed mile-championship loss to Belgium's Protin is ordered rerun at Paris without fresh trials, while Dutch riders sweep several amateur and tandem events and Cordang of Holland wins the 100-kilometer amateur title.
- Before 3,000 people in Toronto, John S. Johnson beats Canadian challenger Fred W. Young in both heats of their match race, winning in 2:17⅘ and then 2:07⅘.
- The Asbury Park Athletic Association's meet draws over 3,000 spectators; Harry Maddox is nipped at the tape in the two-thirds-mile Class B event by F. H. Allen and Claude Leatherbury, while Titus falls short of the two-thirds-mile unpaced record in the wind.
- Ogden, Utah's Wasatch Wheelmen hold their meet on a rough half-mile horse track; Walter Webb wins the novice event in a state-record 2:16, and A. E. Hyde and the tandem of Graf and Reynolds add further state records.
- Willimantic, Connecticut's Thread City Cycles hold their fourth annual meet before 2,000 spectators; a group of Boston "pothunters" is outpaced by New England's home riders, and veteran Ed A. Nelson competes in the trial heats.
- In Paris, Michael laps a fatigued Lesna twice to win their fifty-kilometer match race easily, while Morin wins the two-kilometer over Gougoltz and Deschamps and Luyten takes the Belgian 100-kilometer championship at Liege.
- At North Attleboro, Massachusetts, the Columbia Bicycle Club's diamond tournament sees E. A. McDuffie and the Butler brothers dominate the Class B events, McDuffie's wheel breaking during a homestretch bid to lower the track's half-mile record.
- At Maryville, Missouri's third annual meet, run on a rain-softened half-mile dirt track, John H. English sweeps the mile, half-mile and one-mile special events ahead of C. F. Whitacre and G. H. Imbrie.
- Richfield Springs, New York's Waiontha Bicycle Club holds its eighth annual tournament after two postponements; Robert Senn wins the twenty-five-mile handicap road race while J. H. Gardiner takes the time prize.
- The Clio Wheelmen of Jersey City Heights draw about 3,000 spectators to their first road meet on the new Hudson County boulevard, with Gregory, Walker and Roome splitting the handicap events.
- The Eagle Bicycle Mfg. Co. is quadrupling its manufacturing capacity with a huge new two-story, 75,000-square-foot factory at Torrington, Connecticut, driven by booming demand for its aluminum-rimmed wheels nationwide.
- Illinois L. A. W. chief consul Jaquish, a longtime devotee of the Eagle ordinary, has George E. Lloyd & Co. build him the "Comanche," a modern safety adapted to carry the chain gear he originally rigged on his old high-wheeler.
- A testimonial letter from rider R. H. Bartsch reports that his Eagle tandem was the only one of three tested machines to survive intact the Manhattan Bicycle Club's Blue Ribbon double century run from New York to Philadelphia and back.
- On the Coney Island cycle path, a Quill Club Wheelmen rider settles an argument among six scorching companions over wheel strength by riding his eighteen-pound Fowler Bantam down a flight of veranda steps without damage.
- A roundup of Fowler bicycle wins nationwide includes ten-year-old Archie Hays winning a twelve-mile road race at Orlando, Florida, Weir and Combs breaking the Brandywine Camp course record at Wilmington, Delaware, and L. E. Lange sweeping Illinois Cycling Club events.
- Louisville, Kentucky dealer E. B. Dye & Co. assigns to the Louisville Trust Co. after the Keating Wheel Co. sues for $2,640, with Albert C. Mead having already purchased the firm's sundries and repair stock.
- Elgin's Illinois Watch Case Co. and C. H. Woodruff & Co. expand production of the "Elgin" wheel, while at Aurora the W. S. Frazier Co. and the Aurora Automatic Machine Co. (whose new ball-and-socket hub washer is sold by Parkhurst & Wilkinson) both add capacity.
- A letter from the Syracuse Cycle Co. touts its riders' sweep at the Minneapolis national circuit meet, including Berney Bird's $400 horse-and-buggy prize in the Deere & Webber twenty-mile road race, for thirteen firsts, nine seconds and ten thirds.
- Chicago lawyer Mr. Jerome's Duplex Saddle Co. markets a saddle whose inner and outer loops both flex under the rider's weight, distributing the spring's action from two points, priced at $4.
- The newly incorporated Richmond Bicycle Co. of Richmond, Indiana, capitalized at $60,000 under president W. N. Wilson, has already ordered material for 7,500 wheels under superintendent J. A. Windsor, Jr.
- John H. Gardner's bi-gear-equipped wheel finishes twelfth in Detroit's Hilsendegen road race and wins first time prize in the Syracuse Athletic Association's ten-mile Cicero-course race in 27:54.
- London correspondent "Will o' the Wisp" reports Humber & Co. shares surging to $75 on rumors of a 25 percent dividend, the Stanley Show holding firm despite a breakaway Coventry Machinists' show, and skepticism toward Hall's spring frame and Count Rosetti's propulsive wheel.
- Milwaukee's bicycle-manufacturing boom is surveyed: the Meiselbach Mfg. Co.'s new St. Paul Avenue plant, the Bolte Mfg. Co. (successor to the Milwaukee Cycle Mfg. Co.), the Telegram Cycle Mfg. Co., and the Julius Andrae & Sons Co. are all expanding for 1896.
- The National Cycle Exhibition Co. secures the Chicago Coliseum at Grace Avenue and 63rd Street for its October 8-12 show, a building the paper calls superior to any prior venue and priced below Madison Square Garden's rates.
- The Davis Sewing Machine Co.'s huge Dayton, Ohio plant, capable of 50,000 wheels a year, will build 25,000 for 1896 following a new 200-by-50-foot building addition.
- E. C. Stearns & Co.'s Dayton agents send a photograph of a 125-pound tandem festooned with 2,300 roses and ridden as Liberty and Uncle Sam in a recent lantern parade.
- The Bearings corrects a prior week's item: the Yost Mfg. Co.'s 1896 output of 4,500 wheels is the planned increase over this year's total, not the total itself.
- A Kansas City survey finds twenty-two agencies carrying forty-one makes reporting a season beyond expectations, with dealers such as the Aladdin Cycle Co., Avery Planter Co. and Columbus Buggy Co. expecting sales to double in 1896 despite some, like C. H. Rebenscheid & Son, losing trade to delayed Stearns deliveries.
- A Melbourne correspondent surveys Australia's British-dominated cycle trade, arguing lighter American wheels could compete if priced comparably, backed by board-of-trade statistics showing colonial cycle imports rising from £54,664 to £81,691 between 1893 and 1894.
- The Prentiss Tool & Supply Co. of New York introduces a machine that bends and heads a spoke in one operation, cutting the process time in half and eliminating the need for a separate bending machine.
- Nationwide trade notes report New York's newly incorporated Stanley Cycle Mfg. Co., Freeport, Illinois's Henney Bicycle Co., new Torrington buildings for the Eagle Bicycle Mfg. Co., and the Illinois Watch Case Co.'s new bicycle line at Elgin.
- Secretary Fred Patee describes the Waverley maker's Philadelphia-area expansion, having bought 1,500,000 feet of tubing with an option on 500,000 more, enough for 60,000 wheels for next year's trade.
- Chicago's International Mfg. Co. has rapidly built a reputation for its "America" wheel, limited to 2,500 machines in 1895 but planning 7,500 for 1896, and prints a testimonial letter from boxer James J. Corbett.
- Forbes & Co.'s kola-tablet compound "Kolako," endorsed by Century Road Club secretary C. M. Fairchild, is reported by riders to sustain strength and prevent exhaustion without side effects.
- The C. A. Taylor Trunk Works of Chicago and New York offers a 100-pound bicycle trunk carrying two wheels with reversed front wheels, priced at $25 and claimed to be fifteen pounds lighter than rival trunks.
- Amid recovering crop conditions, Lincoln, Nebraska's dealers report a strong season: E. R. Guthrie's Rambler agency, C. L. Shader's eight-year Columbia agency, F. G. Yule's new Victor agency, and N. P. Curtice & Co.'s ladies' riding school.