The Bicycling World, Vol 2, No 19
Articles in this issue
- The editor covers the ongoing League Meet location debate, introduces Will H. Thompson as a new contributor, and jokes about a speech given at a recent club dinner.
- An enthusiastic preview of the forthcoming L.A.W. annual meet urges all cyclists to attend and describes what the gathering means for the future of organized cycling in America.
- A correspondent describes a cycling tour across parts of Europe, comparing road conditions, touring customs, and local attitudes to cyclists with those in America.
- The editors argue strongly in favor of holding a formal bicycle and tricycle exhibition alongside the L.A.W. annual meet, modeled on London's successful Stanley Show.
- Under the Glances Abroad department, Bicycling News praises the Canonbury Bicycle Club — originator of the 'Danger Board' movement — for replacing the usual winter 'smokers' with an athletic Assault-at-Arms entertainment, and urges other London clubs to follow.
- E. F. Rogers writes from Cairo describing a ride to the Pyramids of Giza on his 'Stanley' bicycle, finding the roads fair apart from a final mile of deep sand, with Arabs running behind him and the usual demands for backsheesh at Cheops; reprinted from the Cyclist.
- Club news includes officer elections at the Buffalo Bi. Club (Edward M. Bell president), the Marlboro' Bi. Club (Lewis P. Frye captain), the Rockingham Bi. Club of Portsmouth, N.H., and the Essex Bicycle Club of Newark, plus a joint run and drill by Washington's Arlington and Capital clubs and a letter from a Montreal clubman on their new gymnasium headquarters.
- Kol Kron summarizes his 1880 riding: 1,474 miles over 58 days on his 46-inch wheel, including a 495-mile autumn tour from Schenectady to New York, a 73-mile day from beyond Buffalo to Erie, Pa., and his fastest spin from Erie to Dunkirk.
- Charles Lockyer's London letter reports the delegates' meeting that organized the annual Hampton Court meet, naming the marshals chosen from the Metropolitan, I Zingari, Surrey, Clarence, Kent, Belgrave, and London Scottish clubs.
- Opening The League Meet department, 'Roxana' previews the L.A.W. directors' special meeting in Boston on 19 March to fix the second annual Meet, presenting satirical credit-and-debit balance sheets for the rival claims of New York, Washington, Philadelphia, and Boston.
- L. W. Seely regrets that Washington wheelmen's case for hosting the League Meet has been misconstrued, insisting they seek only to state their city's advantages and that local opinion ranks Boston second, with a New York Meet considered 'simply suicidal.'
- 'G. E. B.' ridicules S. Conant Foster's telegram touting permission to carry bicycles on New York's Elevated Roads as a Meet inducement, describing the absurdity of hauling a full-nickelled 54-inch machine up the crooked station stairways.
- 'Quaker City' presents Philadelphia's claim to the League Meet: thirty miles of drives in 3,000-acre Fairmount Park, free bicycle storage in the twenty-one-acre Centennial Exposition building, and Pennsylvania Railroad trains stopping at the Zoological Garden station.
- A New Haven correspondent weighs the Meet contenders, conceding Washington's fine roads but noting its distance from most wheelmen, and favors New York with a run down the Avenue under Captain Munroe of the New York Bi. Club.
- Andrew S. Brownell of San Francisco rebuts Will H. Thompson's defense of the English 1-to-9 archery target values, arguing point by point that the American 1-to-5 values based on distance measurement are simpler and fairer, and noting the Pacific Archery Association has already adopted them.
- 'Genevieve' humorously recounts how ladies at a small White Mountains hotel took up archery with bows bought from a visiting Indian pedlar, endured errant arrows and the mockery of fellow guests, and finally burned their tackle after a departing guest's parting jibe at the 'Champion Archery Club.'
- 'Manhattan' reports a friendly indoor match of six-man teams shooting 90 arrows at 40 yards, the New York Archers (led by Frazer, 536) beating the Spuyten Duyvel Archers (led by Hopkins, 518) by 3,031 to 2,763, with a return match set for 26 March.
- The Executive Committee of the National Archery Association, in session at Corresponding Secretary G. F. E. Pearsall's Brooklyn office, invites club applications ahead of the Grand Annual Meeting in Prospect Park, Brooklyn, in July.
- The League's standing membership notice is followed by Corresponding Secretary Albert S. Parsons's list of applicants, including the Mercury Bicycle Club of New York, the Centaur Bicycle Club of Philadelphia, and members of Washington's Arlington Bi. Club.
- A New Hampshire correspondent describes the Portsmouth Club's new forty-by-sixty-foot hall and its fancy-riding exhibition of 22 February, Major Urch's improved marine bicycle, a how-to on the stand-still feat, and a pending lawsuit over a horse frightened by three bicyclers.
- 'Globe' reports the club's annual meeting of 8 March at the Brockton House, electing William H. Bryant president, and the comic battle over new club shirts and head-gear that ended with animosity 'buried in oysters'; the club unanimously favors Boston for the League Meet.
- 'C. W. L.' answers a reader's query with a year's experience of Hancock's non-slipping tires on his 'Special Club,' crediting their corrugated inner surfaces and grooved treads, and praises the Coventry Machinists Company's rubber suspension saddle spring.