The Bicycling World, Vol 3, No 2
Articles in this issue
- Opening editorial column including a humorous story about a 'Masher' who laughed at a Boston cyclist's header into a gutter and was himself silenced, and a note on growing public demand for seats at Music Hall for the May 30 League Meet evening entertainment.
- Editorial arguing that wheelmen should defend their rights assertively rather than submissively — citing a Boston riding teacher who tried to horse into a group of cyclists, a LAW consul injured by a dog bite, and another whose arm was fractured when a vicious dog threw him from his machine.
- Continued review and compilation from Henry Sturmey's new tricycle handbook, comparing rotary-crank and lever propulsion, geared-down small-wheel machines, and speedy unequal-wheel types like the Excelsior and Harvard, before classifying all tricycles into eight classes by steering and driving arrangement.
- Humorous satirical sketch by 'Launcelot' imagining the League of American Wheelmen's Boston parade: the 'ancient and honorable Bostons' in varied uniform colors like a 'well-stamped cigar box,' the Washington Capital Club riding with feet off the pedals, the League unattached collapsing into 'a mountain of spokes, handles, rims, and profanity,' and a clown division that wabbles, wriggles, and soars majestically into space.
- 'Kol Kron' starts from the Battery at 9 a.m., takes the ferry to Vanderbilt's Landing, and rides south to Fort Wadsworth and along the eight-mile macadamized shore road, reporting on road quality through West Brighton and toward Newark and Orange, plus spring rides on Washington's asphalt and the deteriorated Brooklyn boulevard to Coney Island.
- A letter from the Pope Manufacturing Co. correcting the impression that individuals may freely import English bicycles: unlicensed importation, sale, use or making infringes their patents, and while past single-machine cases were settled for the usual ten-dollar royalty, future infringers will be held liable for costs and damages as well.
- Railroad Committee chairman Wm. Vinal Burt advises wheelmen travelling to the Boston L.A.W. Meet to buy one-way tickets via the Shore Line (a reduced-rate special sleeping-car train returns to New York on Monday night), warns Western riders off the Erie Railway, and notes the New York Central and all New England roads will carry bicycles free.
- The L.A.W. directors ruled that clubs will form in parade order by date of admission to the League; a full table lists all 80 clubs with admission dates and member counts — Boston (54), Milwaukee (52), Germantown and Massachusetts (51 each) leading — for a total of 1,399 club members.
- Brief notes from Cleveland, Canandaigua, Burlington, Montreal, and Roxbury bicycle clubs, covering new memberships, planned excursions, and preparations for the League Meet.
- Milwaukee Notes by 'Sugna': twenty-six members turned out in the club's new dark-green and snuff-colored uniforms for the 7 May run out through the Soldier's Home, a 56-inch wheel nearly beat a running horse over a mile and a half on the bay road, and the club's favorite road drink — the 'Cincinnati' of beer and pop — gets its own verse.
- 'Steno' reports the formal opening of the Chicago season with a thirty-mile Chicago and Ariel Clubs run to South Chicago and a moonlit boulevard return, negotiations with the South and West Side park commissioners over boulevard access, and a planned 2-4 July tour of Waukesha County summer resorts with the Milwaukee club.
- The Providence Bicycle Club invites visiting wheelmen to join a leisurely forty-five-mile 'go as you please' run to Boston ahead of the Meet, starting at 7 a.m. sharp on Saturday 28 May from Prospect and Waterman streets by the Brown University grounds; secretary J. A. Cross will have arrivals met by committee.
- Louisville has taken up bicycling with genuine enthusiasm, encouraged by the Commercial newspaper, whose clipped account describes a silent signal-drill exhibition: Captain Thomas standing still while twelve riders circled him in ever-smaller rings and pairs rode with crossed hands on each other's handles.
- Standing League of American Wheelmen department: membership terms (fees to Dillwyn Wistar of Philadelphia, applications to corresponding secretary Albert S. Parsons of Cambridgeport), new unattached members, Toronto and Lockport club rosters, League badge orders, and Canadian Directorate consul appointments for Toronto, Kingston, Newmarket, Brockville and St. John, N.B.