The Bicycling World, Vol 20, No 17
Articles in this issue
- The leader gives the whole number over to the L. A. W. National Assembly, reserving editorial comment on the meeting until next week, and warns that correspondents must give way to the volume of League matter; ex-President Luscomb's letters to the Ohio officials are held over.
- Presents a Boston Globe portrait of James R. Dunn, President-elect of the L. A. W., and pledges the World's support for him and his associates William H. Emery and George R. Bidwell.
- The New York State officers met at the Grand Union Hotel on Feb. 14 under Chief Consul Bull: Jenkins reported a $500 damages verdict for a Poughkeepsie cyclist, Potter's Highways committee asked to be left free of national interference, Bull's vouchers and integrity were endorsed 28 to 1, and $50 was voted to the New York State Roads Improvement Association.
- A sketch of the delegates and editors filling the Grand Union and Murray Hill Hotels before the Feb. 17 annual meeting - Secretary Bassett, Atwater, Brewster, Prial of the Wheel, Miles of the Referee, MacOwen of the Athlete, Kirkpatrick, Potter, Dr. Butler of Buffalo, Albert Mott and Chief Consul Bull.
- The Assembly was called to order at 11.30 at the Grand Union Hotel with President Charles H. Luscomb in the chair; the roll of members present and votes cast is given, from Luscomb, Dunn, Lawton and Bassett through Kirkpatrick, Collister, Boyle and Spiers.
- Luscomb reviews the Browning, King & Co. uniform contract dispute, the quarrel over the Wheel as New York Division organ, the Hagerstown meet, the defeat of the railroads' 25-cent charge for wheels, and his removal of Isaac B. Potter from the Rights and Privileges Committee; the report was rejected 69 to 18.
- W. M. Brewster's accounts show $3,797.25 received - including $3,000 from the Secretary and $300 from the Bicycling World - against $1,909.84 paid out, leaving a balance of $1,887.31.
- Abbot Bassett records a membership of 12,500 (New York 2,154, Massachusetts 1,644, Pennsylvania 1,460, and 171 lady members), income of $16,701, and his renumbering of the whole roll by date of entrance, reserving the first hundred numbers for executive officers.
- Chairman A. Moore Berry and Isaac B. Potter report eighteen damage cases, aid to the Kansas Division against a Topeka bridge ordinance and to a Tennessee suit, the defeat of a Missouri bill compelling riders to dismount for horses and mules, and declare Luscomb's removal of Potter void and of no legal effect.
- The special legislation committee appointed Dec. 7, 1889 describes drafting the New York highways bill now before the Ways and Means Committee, being told by Chief Consul Emery to keep hands off Massachusetts, and visits to Maryland, Ohio and Virginia.
- William H. Emery, C. L. Brockway and W. A. Davis report that no business was referred to them during the year, and recommend the single by-law amendment permitting the appointment of “State Tailors” in Divisions wishing them.
- Dr. Charles S. Butler's report on the good-roads campaign: 35,000 copies of the “Improvement of Highways” book printed at no cost to the League, road-building courses at Johns Hopkins, Vanderbilt, Harvard and Pennsylvania University, and an argument for a State superintendent-engineer in place of the county road system.
- W. M. Brewster reports that the Pennsylvania Railroad now carries wheels free, that New England lines still charge unreasonable tariffs, and urges wheelmen always to demand a receipt from baggagemen who charge for a machine.
- Chairman Chas. S. Davol lists the amateurs disqualified (Windle, Heilborn, Van Sicklen, Hood) and reinstated (Ives, Hulett, Turpin), the season's championships won by Colie Bell, A. C. Banker, J. P. Clark and W. E. Crist, and the new Rule G forbidding amateurs to take expenses from athletic clubs.
- Abbot Bassett reports that his two colleagues never served, that only ten of thirty Divisions returned hotel and Consul lists, and that the hand book will instead appear as a “hotel number” of the Bicycling World at the opening of the riding season.
- The Assembly rejected Luscomb's presidential report 69 to 18 after protests by Chief Consuls Emery, Kirkpatrick and Bull, accepted the Rights and Privileges report 60 to 28 with Potter's signature attached, and elected James R. Dunn president with 85 of 92 votes, Emery and Bidwell vice presidents and Brewster treasurer.
- Dr. Emery's amendment to Article IX, allowing the Executive Committee to appoint a national tailor and each Chief Consul a Division tailor drawing cloth from the Secretary, was accepted and all uniform matters referred to the Executive Committee.
- After a heated debate between Isaac B. Potter and Dr. Butler the Assembly adopted the New York State Division's resolution endorsing the Coggeshall-Rhodes bill and deprecating the rival Assembly Bill No. 10 introduced by the national committee.
- Rule changes made at the Board's Grand Union Hotel meeting of Feb. 16: the country divided into seven racing districts each with its own District Racing Board, a ban on race officials betting, a five-mile residence rule for team members, and a new rule letting the referee award first prize to a lone surviving contestant.
- Geo. D. Mitchell's touring serial continues from Soissons to Laon and on through Marle and Hirson to the Belgian frontier, with two-mile wooded coasts, corduroy-clad peasants in wooden shoes, dogs running under the wheels, and a train taken into Brussels.
- Trade paragraphs on the Coventry Machinists' $120 diamond-frame Swift Model C, the Cycle Improvement Co.'s handle-bar anti-vibrator, A. G. Spalding's election as vice president of the Overman Wheel Co., Sidwell & Saben taking the New England Rudge agency, the new diamond-frame New Mail at Read's, and Singer's $75 “Miniature Safety.”
- Describes Sterling Elliott's patented chain, whose solid steel links are drilled with felt-filled slots that feed oil to the connecting pins; one is said to have run 13 months on the road before the felts needed refilling.
- Geo. R. Bidwell warns manufacturers and dealers that the “Perfection Bicycle Alarm” is covered by United States patent No. 285,933 of Oct. 2, 1883, and that sellers of infringing gong bells are liable to damages and injunction.
- Lists the newly elected League officers: President James R. Dunn of Massillon, Ohio; First Vice President Dr. W. H. Emery of Roxbury; Second Vice President Geo. R. Bidwell of New York; Treasurer W. M. Brewster of St. Louis; Secretary Abbot Bassett of 12 Pearl Street, Boston.
- Names the national committees for the year: Mealy, Casselberry and Pennell on Membership; Butler, Share and Beal on Improvement of Highways; Berry, Perkins and Cossum on Rights and Privileges; Emery, Davis and Brockway on Rules and Regulations; Davol's five-man Racing Board; Brewster on Transportation.
- Grant Bell of Minneapolis has been reinstated as an amateur by unanimous vote of the Racing Board, signed C. S. Davol, Chairman.
- Chief Consul W. A. Davis appoints A. W. Hoffman of Warsaw a Local Consul of the Illinois Division.
- W. A. Davis lists League hotel terms at Abingdon (Commercial Hotel, $2.00), Braidwood (Cottage Hotel, $1.50) and Dixon (Nachusa House, $2.00).
- Chief Consul Robt. Holm appoints the Owens House at Green Top an official League hotel, $1.00 to L. A. W. members on showing their ticket against a regular rate of $1.50.
- Robt. Holm notifies dealers and tourists that the Richelieu Hotel, 1312 Washington avenue, is now the official League hotel for St. Louis and that the Lindell is no longer a League house.
- Michigan Chief Consul A. B. Richmond adds Hotel List No. 6 - the Exchange at Holly, Rerdun House at Plymouth, Owen House at Farmington, Hodges at Pontiac, Studden at Centreville and the Northwestern at Hancock - and Repair Shops List No. 5, Mr. Bristol of Holly and Frank E. Brown of Three Rivers.
- Official text of amended Rules A, E, H and 32 and the new Rule 26: nine national L. A. W. championships established, the country divided into seven racing districts, no betting by race-meeting officials, and team members required to have lived within five miles of the club's headquarters for six months.
- List 229, total 86, carrying League membership to 12,586, with candidates from California, the District of Columbia, Illinois, Louisiana, Maryland and a block of 32 from the Social Wheelmen of South Bend, Indiana.
- Directory of Chief Consuls and Secretary-Treasurers for every Division from California to Wisconsin - Thompson, Post, Atwater, Davis, Hearsey, Mott, Emery, Richmond, Holm, Bull, High, Boyle, Davol - with Joseph Pennell of London as Foreign Marshal.