The Bearings, Vol 6, No 11
Articles in this issue
- Editorial criticising the League of American Wheelmen and the Wheelman Company for withholding members' full street addresses from League records, arguing that the 'expediency' cited by the Executive Committee is merely a pretext for keeping the membership roll as a profitable commercial asset.
- Editorial squib about a class-based dispute at an Evansville, Ind. race meet, where certain members of a Chicago club team requested hotel rooms on floors not shared with other teammates, causing a lively internal row.
- One-line satirical squib suggesting that bibles—now admitted as pure amateur prizes—are most fitting as consolation race awards.
- Reprints and implicitly rebuts an earlier Irish Cyclist editorial by editor R. J. Mecredy doubting Americans could defeat British riders, asking what Mecredy thinks now given Zimmerman's subsequent record-breaking dominance.
- Editorial piece on cycling fans who viciously attack writers for perceived bias toward rival clubs, questioning what such 'kiddishness' accomplishes and noting it rarely worries the targeted scribes.
- Satirical one-liner about an 'Inducer' who quietly purchases 'amateur' souls and chuckles about the tricks of the trade.
- Quoting and rebutting a Rochester man who wants cycling kept at a 'high standard,' pointing out that the lack of standards and commercialism he fears are already the present reality.
- Brief satirical squib mocking an advertising copywriter who boasts that a manufacturer's new wheel, with only a few produced, is 'already making itself heard'—prompting the question 'What, already?'
- Brief editorial drawing a parallel between a jailed prisoner told he can't be incarcerated yet plainly is, and Pittsfield, Ill. farmers who haul wheat over dirt roads at twice the cost of good roads yet claim they cannot afford to build them.
- Short squib noting that a popular Louisville racer won a dress suit just before his wedding day and apparently did not trade it for a medal to maintain his amateur standing.
- Brief editorial squib about racer John Johnson's misplaced pride in refusing a fifteen-yard handicap at Evansville rather than accepting placement off scratch.
- Humorous anecdote about a new club member who toured from Arizona on a cone-bearing ordinary and tells a tall tale about Death Valley being so hot that fire would not rise, leaving him to subsist on raw lizards for a week.
- Very brief squib observing that a dozen or more cyclists would be objects of awed curiosity if they walked through any of the big horse-paddocks of the country.
- Brief squib noting that England used to break cycling records and sneer at American performances, but those days are plainly over.
- Humorous fictional column by 'William Stwinkle,' recounting champion Zimmerman's visit to Johnson's Corners with his team of Springfield horses; a wild runaway race against a mule team ends with Zimmerman chasing the mules on foot and leaving Stwinkle to manage his grocery, music store, and four horses.
- Department of miscellaneous cycling briefs: Prince Wells of Louisville becomes a father; Illinois logs 83 League applications against Connecticut's 14 and Ohio's 17; T. O. Hall and W. C. Tyler coast down Mount Wilson at Pasadena; the Cook County Wheelmen plan new club quarters; Cleveland lady cyclists hold a rainbow party.
- Report on the first annual race meet of the Solid City Wheelmen at Fort Scott, Kansas, October 6, attended by 3,000 people; R. M. Tidd won the half-mile open final and Bert Harding the one-mile open, with James Joyce Jr. of Hartford as referee and seventeen heats completed in under three hours.
- Brief item noting that F. W. Gerould, A. A. Billingsley, and Burton F. White were renominated for Illinois Division chief consul, vice consul, and secretary-treasurer at a Chicago meeting of League club representatives.
- Correspondent C. W. Hartung reports from Rochester, Kent, on the Society of Cyclists' annual congress—including Dr. Richardson's inaugural address on cycling, rural postal delivery, and aerial flight—plus the Catford Club's fifty-mile championship won by A. G. Fentiman in record southern-roads time of 2:40:25, the North Road Club's hundred-mile event, and F. J. Osmond's unsuccessful attempt on A. W. Harris's mile record of 2:12 3/5.
- Satirical notice reprinting a garbled League member address ('John Smith Council Bluffs Iowa' instead of 'John Smith, Council Bluffs, Iowa') as a concrete example of the Wheelman Company employees' careless handling of member data at L.A.W. expense.
- Editorial on the Rhode Island General Assembly's resolution urging a comprehensive roads exhibit at the World's Fair, contrasting it with Congress's earlier refusal to establish such a department despite strong advocacy by Colonel A. A. Pope.
- Editorial updating readers on the organisation of the Century Road Club of America: the draft constitution (modelled on the L.A.W.) is nearly complete, William Herrick is named prospective high centurion, and the paper invites nominations for president, vice presidents, secretary, treasurer, and state chief centurions.
- Preview of the founding convention of the National League for Good Roads, scheduled for October 20 at Central Music Hall, Chicago, highlighting the involvement of General Horace Porter and Chauncey M. Depew as New York Chamber of Commerce delegates and the key roles of Isaac B. Potter and F. W. Gerould.
- Editorial exposing the Wheelman Company's practice of charging L.A.W. Divisions $100 for access to their own membership mailing lists for meet promotions, citing Maryland Division's successful refusals in 1888 and at the Hagerstown meet as precedents for forcing compliance.
- Comprehensive roundup of British cycling press scepticism toward John S. Johnson's claimed 1:56 3/5 mile record at Independence, Iowa, with extended commentary from The Cyclist, British Sport, Sport and Play, the Scottish Cyclist, the Irish Cyclist, Bicycling News, and the Brooklyn Citizen, all doubting the horse-paced flying-start performance.
- A joke about a bicycle editor who, on arriving in Heaven, immediately asks St. Peter to be directed to the other place rather than hear another word about pneumatic tires or elliptical sprocket wheels.
- A short quip asserting every amateur racing man has his price, joking that the fictitious rider Slowsby simply gives himself away for nothing.
- Department of miscellaneous club and cycling news: Lincoln and Ravenswood clubs open the indoor season with a joint smoker; Philadelphia's lantern parade draws a crowd but mixed reviews; Cleveland Wheel Club elects Will Sayle president after W. A. Skinkle resigns; Connecticut Division conducts a cycling census; Frank G. Lenz on his world tour is escorted through Vancouver by sixty wheelmen; Philip Sousa opens his Chicago season at the Auditorium October 22.
- Illustrated personality profile of Joseph D. Guinea, an irrepressible Irish-American cycling social figure in Chicago renowned for spontaneous wit, deflating false pride, and helping William Herrick pioneer the 'hard times' smoker that spread across the country and to Australia.
- Reports on W. W. Windle's new marks at Springfield, Mass.: a standing mile of 2:05 2/5 (first quarter :33 4/5), flying half-mile of :57 4/5, and flying mile of 2:02 3/5 on October 7, all behind triplet pacemakers with George A. Atwater of the L.A.W. Racing Board as referee.
- Brief note that A. W. Harris, the 18-year-old new holder of the English mile record, set a flying-start mile of 2:10 in England.
- Preview of the Chicago Cycling Club's tournament at Washington Park track the following Friday and Saturday: N. H. Van Sicklen travelled east to secure Zimmerman, Tyler, and other crack riders, with a letter confirming Zimmerman and Rich booked; C. W. Davis recorded flying quarters of 28 2/5 seconds in training.
- Brief item noting that Philadelphia's racing season closes October 22 with the Columbus Day races of the Tioga Athletic Association, which has prepared a large and handsome prize list.
- Report on the dispute between A. E. Lumsden and L. D. Munger over diamond prizes from the Evansville meet: Munger led at the three- and four-mile points while pacing Lumsden, who went on to break the five-mile competitive record; referee Prial will likely split the diamonds one apiece.
- News that Baltimore is negotiating to build a new half-mile track because the existing quarter-mile facility's records have been set so low they can never be equalled on a shorter course, with prominent men planning a rival to Springfield's track.
- Brief clarification that Johnson's 2:13 mile at Jacksonville was ridden on black loam rather than asphalt as Europeans assumed, and that with faster pacemakers he could evidently have done much better.
- Note that the Jacksonville meet management is arranging a match race between Johnson and Lumsden to recover from the meet's financial losses, postponed from Thursday at Lumsden's request for rest.
- Brief editorial on the advantages of triplet bicycles as pacing machines over horse-drawn sulkies: they throw no dirt, do not cut up the track, and cut the wind admirably—though no triplet has yet covered a mile in under two minutes.
- Brief item about W. F. Peironnet, who started at scratch in a five-mile road race among wholesale-firm employees on Fifth Avenue, Chicago, won the race, and collected four of the twenty prizes because only seven competed and they divided the surplus.
- Department of brief racing news: the Buffalo B.C. plans a big 1893 tournament; Fournier defeated Cassignard in Paris match races for $1,000; R. O. Baumann of Dayton suspended sixty days for a false entry; Tom Jefferis of Louisville marries Miss Cora Lowry; Roy Donaldson breaks the Springfield–Jacksonville road record in 2:18:00 over thirty-five miles.
- Detailed two-day report on the Evansville, Ind. meet: Bliss won the two-mile handicap masterfully, Lumsden took the half-mile open, Munger won the lap race, Ballard claimed a $125 mile-handicap diamond with a brilliant come-from-behind ride, and Roy Keator exhibited on one wheel in 4:23 3/5; the meet lost roughly $800 with a cold, indifferent crowd.
- Results of the Winnebago Wheelmen's postponed tournament at Fond du Lac, Wis.: Louis Reed of Ripon won the five-mile handicap from scratch and the one-mile Winnebago County championship, with Mattie Martin and F. Terry Andrae of Milwaukee also starting from scratch in the five-mile.
- Illustrated feature presenting portrait vignettes of three Chicago women cyclists, accompanying pictorial coverage of female participation in the city's cycling scene.
- Report on the Colorado Wheelmen's fall tournament at Denver, marred by multiple accidents on under-banked narrow turns including a quarter-mile pile-up where Rutherford won by being first to regain his feet; the state two-mile record fell to 5:21 and McGuire won the one-mile championship in 2:40.
- Report on the Wauseon C.C.'s silver tournament in Wauseon, Ohio, October 7, attended by 15,000 spectators with Tony Leon's military band brought by special train from Toledo; A. L. Baker of Columbus swept the half-mile open and one-mile open events.
- Brief report on bicycle races at the Soldiers' and Sailors' reunion in Belleville, Ill.: Al Baker of Belleville won the October 5 novice race with Eli Silverburg of St. Louis second, and Gus Loeffel, L. J. Winkler, W. P. Laing, and George Tivy among winners on the later days.
- Report on the Lincoln Cycling Club's races at Parkside, Chicago: A. T. Heywood won five firsts and captured an Imperial pneumatic, Charles Heile took the novice, O. C. Green won the mile club championship, and Bert Green took both the mile and two-mile handicaps.
- Results of the Cook County Wheelmen's road race over the Oak Park course: F. B. Hart (2:30 handicap) won in 32:36, with C. D. Cutting recording the fastest actual time of 31:36 from scratch.
- Editorial update on the proposed L.A.W. Veterans' organisation, encouraging ineligible riders to participate regardless, and printing letters of support from W. H. Canniff of the A.T. & S.F. R.R. (riding since 1880) and J. Willard Parker of the Niagara Machine Co., Buffalo (rode the first Star bicycle in that region in 1881).
- Brief race result: George Banker won the one-mile and two-mile handicaps and the half-mile scratch at Manhattan Field, New York, at the Columbia A.C. games.
- Report on the Holyoke, Mass. road race: J. D. Cronin, who won the previous year from the nine-minute mark, again won in 49:20 from a four-and-a-half-minute handicap, with F. A. Landry of Springfield recording the fastest actual time of 48:17.
- T. W. Boyd & Son, of Montreal, write to THE BEARINGS calling it the ideal cycle journal.
- Detailed editorial analysis of the ruling in Featherstone v. Bidwell upholding claims 4 and 5 of the Dunlop pneumatic tire reissue patent (September 9, 1890), printing all seven reissue claims plus the broader 1891 patent, and reporting a manufacturer's view that tires held in the rim by air pressure may not infringe either the Dunlop or Thomas patents.
- Fred Patee of Rouse, Hazard & Co., Peoria, announces the firm will manufacture the Rudge bicycle in America and plans a patriotic red-white-and-blue racing campaign for the 1893 season, pushing hard into Chicago business.
- Letter from W. G. Blish of Niles, Mich., critically applying work-energy law to the elliptical sprocket wheel, arguing its claimed 10% power gain contradicts settled mechanical principles and that dead-centre losses could be eliminated more completely by a lever-and-clutch mechanism.
- Trade supplement maintenance tips: use naphtha (not a drier) to thin enamel for smooth application; patch inner tubes from the inside using N.Y. Belting or Overman outfits rather than outside patching, which loosens under tube movement; dust clincher inners with soapstone to prevent adhesion to the outer cover.
- Trade news department: W. C. Paine and Dunham share Evansville's cycle trade having each sold over 100 wheels; the Airtite tire withstands a climb of Corey Hill at 15 lbs pressure without creep; new Ariel (Goshen) and Swift racer (18 lbs) debut in Chicago; Elmore Mfg. Co. and a Rockford factory are announced; A. O. McGarrett joins Overman as road representative; the Raleigh adopts the Garford three-coil saddle and Luigi Cantu of Milan wins Italy's long-distance championship on a Raleigh.