The Bearings, Vol 12, No 7
Articles in this issue
- Cooper climbs to second in the percentage "thermometer" after sweeping all three of his races at Rochester and Buffalo, while Bald extends his lead further still; new team and individual point tables show the two-man Monarch team of Cooper and Bliss nearly matching the three-man Columbia squad's season total.
- A nearly empty Buffalo grandstand watches Cooper win a disputed, twice-run mile open over two days of the New York Division meet, with Bliss and Rigby also shining and Fred Loughead setting an unofficial Class A quarter-mile mark.
- A ragged, slow-run national circuit meet at Hartford sees Bald win a farcical mile open over Murphy and Cabanne, while newcomer Earl Kiser of the Stearns team draws notice by nearly matching the leaders.
- At Meriden, Connecticut, Bald narrowly beats Cabanne twice by inches, with Kiser again showing surprising speed against the leaders ahead of the Springfield tournament.
- Philadelphia's Time Wheelmen host their third annual century run to Wilmington, Delaware and back with over 400 starters, winning the George W. Childs cup for the third straight year despite a rider breaking three ribs in a collision.
- Chairman Gideon lifts the suspensions on Cabanne, Titus and Murphy so they can race at Springfield, on condition they forfeit any prizes won if the underlying charges against them are proven.
- An editorial cites a magistrate's ruling that a policeman who threw a fast-riding cyclist to stop him was more culpable than the scorching rider, since he should have sworn out a warrant rather than committing a crime himself.
- An editorial lays out what makes a race meet profitable: securing early circuit dates, competent officials, a sound programme, and above all skilled advertising through lithographs, small newspaper notices, and a good press agent.
- Milwaukee's W. C. Schrader and A. F. Bingenheimer, both riding Andrae wheels, are noted for a season of Wisconsin competition records just as their form pushes them toward Class B.
- Eight northwest-side Chicago clubs organize a team road-racing series for a $150 trophy donated by Nels Juul, alongside a busy Saturday of local road races including Bicker's course-record ten miles for the South Side C. C. and Hoeft's win of the Æolus Club's Keats cup.
- At London's Catford track, Stocks wins the twelve-hour gold vase race with 296 miles 1,715 yards, while other British items report the Volunteer Cyclists' 100-mile team race near Dumfries and Parlby's new flying-quarter record.
- A joking cartoon exchange between a "Pacemaker Goose" and a League member pokes fun at Iowa's poor roads and the Waverley riders who follow them regardless.
- Over two days at Springfield's Hampden Park, Eddie Bald sweeps both Class B open events to confirm his championship, C. R. Newton dominates Class A with a new competition record of 2:04⁄₅, and Sanger upsets local favorite Tyler in the professional mile.
- At the Macon fair tournament in Decatur, Illinois, J. F. Faries wins the mile open in 2:50 and G. B. Rogers takes the two-mile handicap.
- A muddy-track meet at Davenport, Iowa sees Bullmont trim his own record against Seal, while W. H. Hyde of Rock Island wins the five-mile handicap.
- At St. Joseph, Missouri's fair meet, Joe Hocker Jr. lowers the quarter-mile open record to :33 and E. Slade cuts the state competition mile record from 2:15 to 2:07¾.
- Some 10,000 spectators watch a slow-timed but well-attended bicycle-race card at Omaha's new fairgrounds.
- At the Le Mars Cycle Club meet in Iowa, L. A. States of Worthington and then H. E. Frederickson of Omaha both break the state's unpaced mile record in succession.
- During Louisville's G. A. R. visitor festivities, a woman chases down and hands a policeman a boy who stole the ribbons decorating her bicycle, then calmly reties them and rides on.
- Dave Post, long with the Hartford Cycle Co., is reported set to join the Peerless Mfg. Co. of Cleveland with a liberal salary and a block of stock.
- A reprinted Cleveland Amusement Gazette item speculates that rival riders are being deliberately rested and pitted fresh against Eddie Bald in an effort to dethrone him from the top of Class B.
- Chairman Gideon transfers Milwaukee's fastest "amateur" riders—Sanger, Schrader, Roth, Crocker, Bingenheimer and others—to Class B, as the Badger Wheelmen's twelve-mile road race draws 3,000 spectators and a first-time racer wins on handicap.
- Chicago's North Side Club proposes internal team road races to build speed and interest, amid talk of a merger between the old Milwaukee Wheelmen and the racing-strong Badger Wheelmen.
- At Norristown, Pennsylvania's fifth annual meet, W. G. Douglass beats Carroll Jack by five yards in a run-over after the two dead-heated in the half-mile open.
- Rain-postponed races at Flushing, Long Island draw 1,500 spectators on a sticky track, with A. B. Wise and Sam Brock among the winners.
- On "bicyclers' day" at the Minnesota State Fair, local farmers crowd dealer exhibits, eagerly questioning riders about the wheel's potential for farm errands and light work.
- At Dixon, Illinois's first annual meet, Lou Franks wins the ten-mile road race from scratch in 26:29 while R. P. Rice and A. A. McLain both break track records in the one-mile events.
- At the Winnebago County fair, local rider W. E. Kenyon is the only Chicago visitor to win a first prize, as Rockford's A. M. Burr sweeps the mile open and two-mile handicap.
- A sparse crowd at Plainfield, New Jersey's frost-affected Crescent Club track sees Starbuck's scratch win in the two-mile handicap draw the day's only real enthusiasm.
- A fire in the Western Union Telegraph Co.'s Louisville storage room destroys eight messenger boys' bicycles beyond repair, melting their rubber tires without a trace.
- At the Lockport Wheelmen's annual meet, Edward F. Leonert wins the fifteen-mile road race and lowers the local half-mile record, while F. F. Goodman cuts the one-mile record from 2:17 to 2:12.
- At Paris's Velodrome Buffalo, "Choppy" Warburton's rider Michael laps Barden repeatedly to win their fifty-kilometer match with ease, and racing notes report Edwards winning in Milan and Desgrange setting a new tricycle 100-kilometer record at Bordeaux.
- Near Utica, a mother's opposition to bloomers and a suitor drives her daughter Florence Moss to marry Jerome Snow on bicycles by moonlight, with a passing minister performing the ceremony mid-ride.
- Barney Oldfield of Toledo sets a new Indiana competition record of 2:10⁄₅ in the mile open at the Goshen, Indiana races.
- At Stevens Point, Wisconsin, William F. Sanger is abruptly transferred to Class B by telegram mid-meet, then lowers the state Class B record to 2:06½ in a specially arranged race.
- Westboro, Massachusetts's Humber Cycle Club meet draws top professionals including Wheeler, Sanger and Murphy, and Chairman Gideon rules that a Class B ringer cannot compete for the Syracuse clubs' Class A lap-race trophy.
- The Pacific Cyclist circuit opens at Petaluma, California with Walter Foster's near-record paced half-mile in :51⁄₅ and a bad fall that breaks Floyd McFarland's shoulder-blade.
- At Dixon, California's Crescent Wheelmen meet, Foster's early pace and a strong headwind produce a bunched, closely fought Class B mile open.
- At Woodland, California, Burke and Slater finish the mile open with handlebars locked, while Ulbricht steals the mile handicap after Jones eases up too soon near the tape.
- Over three days at Chico, California, Foster, Byrne, Metcalfe and Ulbricht lower several coast records, capping the first half of the Pacific Cyclist circuit on the state's fastest track.
- Some 7,000 spectators watch San Jose's state meet, where Wilbur Edwards returns to Class B racing without a win and F. M. Byrne lowers the coast Class A half-mile record to 1:01.
- Threatening weather and a heavy track dampen the Riverton Athletic Association's meet in New Jersey, with Frank Turner winning the mile open.
- Handicapper S. A. Miles is teased after badly misjudging Gus Steele's form; Steele wins his mile handicap by more than his allowance and then breaks the Illinois state record the same day.
- Chicago's P. J. Dasey is forced into the fence and seriously hurt by two Toledo riders in the closing lap of a half-mile open at Elkhart, Indiana.
- Professional F. C. Fuhrman of Buffalo's Rambler Bicycle Club rides a Buffalo-to-Le Roy century in 5:32:20, breaking two standing records for the course.
- At St. Paul, Minnesota, Charles Hofer and R. H. McCleary split the honors in the local fairground bicycle races.
- An essay by advertising consultant Nathaniel C. Fowler Jr., reprinted from the Trade Press, argues trade-paper advertising must be continuous, factual and focused on connecting buyer and seller rather than merely promoting the advertiser's name.
- R. P. Searle sets off again from Chicago on a renewed attempt at the Chicago-New York cycling record, reaching Ashtabula, Ohio despite a troublesome knee injury from his previous ride.
- Bicycle races headline Grand Rapids, Michigan's state fair, with Chicago's S. C. Cox winning two events; a sidebar reports Philadelphia's touring Lagan brothers rescued by monks after getting lost overnight in the Alps.
- The Fowler Cycle Mfg. Co. disputes a rival Stearns pamphlet's claim to a Waukesha road race prize actually won by Fowler rider A. C. Mertens of Minneapolis.
- Fowler announces a 500-wheel order from St. Louis's Meyer, Bannerman & Co. after the firm compared eight high-grade lines and chose the Fowler.
- Fowler Cycle Mfg. Co. previews a lavish September 21 opening celebration for its new Ashland Boulevard store, with $750 in prizes including a tandem and Bantam racers for attending clubs.
- Fowler contrasts its policy of not paying riders salaries with rival manufacturers who spend heavily to field Class B teams that score only a handful of points on the circuit.
- An editorial warns manufacturers against overcommitting to low-margin jobber contracts at the expense of cultivating more profitable retail agency business for 1896.
- Philadelphia dealers report brisk September orders, including a carload of Eclipse wheels for R. J. Walker and four firsts for the Stearns "Yellow Fellow" at the Norristown meet; a sidebar notes Rochester's Sager Mfg. Co. saddle contracts with twenty-six makers.
- A tour of Syracuse's booming wheel industry covers the Barnes company's new "White Flyer" racer, E. C. Stearns & Co.'s expanding orange-enamel plant supplying three major jobbing houses, and I. A. Weston & Co.'s parts factory.
- The W. F. & John Barnes Co. of Rockford, Illinois introduces a new upright drill with a 22½-inch swing, filling the gap between its 20- and 25-inch models.
- George N. Pierce & Co. of Buffalo plans a full 1896 line of juvenile, ladies' and men's wheels weighing 18 to 23 pounds, building 15,000 machines listing at $75 to $100.
- London correspondent "Will o' the Wisp" reports the Coventry Machinists' Co.'s $135,000 annual loss, the ongoing narrow-tread controversy, and experiments with the Collier two-speed gear.
- A remarkably prescient 1869 French magazine article predicting the velocipede's coming universal popularity is reprinted from L'Illustration and Le Veloce.
- Practical advice describes mounting a camera and tripod behind the saddle on a small board so touring cyclists can carry photographic equipment without hindering steering.
- Minneapolis dealers gear up for 1896, led by Deere & Webber's C. U. Velie ordering 5,000 wheels of one make and new clubs, including the Spaldings and Crimson Rims, forming in the city.
- The Rochester Cycle Mfg. Co. moves into a new six-story factory, doubling capacity to 9,000 machines for 1896 across five models listing at $75 to $125.
- The Pratt Mfg. Co. of Coldwater, Michigan completes a plant turning out 1,000 rock-elm wood rim sets a day.
- O. J. Faxon & Co.'s fire-damaged Puritan Cycle Works in Boston installs new machinery to resume full production of Puritan bicycles by October 1.
- The Enterprise Mfg. Co. introduces "Snowflake," a perfumed, stick-form bicycle chain lubricant claimed not to soil hands or clothing.
- A Chicago showroom tour previews 1896 wheels from Sieg & Walpole's Windsor, the Fulton Machine Works' expanded Thistle factory, the Peerless line's invisible-joint frames, the new Shirk, and the Royal, alongside Fowler's upcoming store-opening celebration.
- Local trade notes report the Adams & Westlake Co. naming its new wheel the "Adlake," H. A. Githens taking the advance '96 Rambler model on the road, and the Monarch company building a 40-inch frame for a Chicago giant.
- Ailing owner W. H. Wilhelm proposes transferring his solvent but indebted Wilhelm Bicycle Co. to his son and superintendent, W. I. Wilhelm, pending creditor approval of an extended repayment plan.
- Hulbert Bros. & Co.'s new Mesinger saddle uses a woven rattan base under felt and leather for a light, durable seat, tested on 1,000 units before full release at $4.
- Short items report E. C. Stearns & Co.'s new Honolulu agents, a Jacksonville, Florida mile record by R. V. Connerat on a Stearns, and R. H. Macy & Co.'s deep discounting of the Webster wheel in New York.
- A technical essay argues spring saddles are obsolete given pneumatic tires, and that saddle shape and position, not springs, determine rider comfort and health.
- Nationwide incorporation and factory notes include Philadelphia's F. H. Dampman Cycle Co., Bridgeport's Premier Cycle Co., and St. Louis's Mississippi Valley Cycle Co.
- The week's patent list includes a pneumatic tire valve, a cycle powder-duster, a brake, a metallic tire fastener, and Max Mannesmann's seamless-tube rolling apparatus.