L. A. W. Bulletin and Good Roads, Vol 27, No 21
Articles in this issue
- Member No. 36,854 forwards Section V of an Albany, N.Y. ordinance passed June 12, 1820 requiring cart tires at least three inches broad, noting how long the wide-tire question has been agitated; the column also covers the League Cycling Club of Philadelphia's new country house and club runs.
- L.A.W. members in Ambia, Indiana stage a satirical photograph of their muddy main street, posing decoy ducks, gunners and anglers with mock signs to shame property-owners into improving the town's streets and roads.
- The Bicycle Corps of the Northwestern Military Academy, Highland Park, Ill.—the same corps that rode from Chicago to Washington—offers its services to the Government, with commander R. P. Davidson noting every member is an L.A.W. man.
- Member No. 164,377 argues the historical specialization of roads—foot-paths to bridle-paths to railways—favors the side-path idea, predicting the bicycle will eventually need its own separate and appropriate roadway.
- Editorial leader endorsing Mr. Merseles of New Jersey's proposal that the L.A.W. establish a national Touring Bureau or "Chair of Touring" at the Secretary's office, and inviting readers to suggest routes for the paper's "Touring Editor."
- Reflects on how wheelmen, once despised by drivers, pedestrians and dogs, now get a fair show, while pedestrians have become the most long-suffering class amid cyclists' bells, trolley gongs, teamsters and watering-carts.
- Argues League members should mark dangerous hills, citing a Newark, N.J. member's account of a rotted, fallen warning sign on a road to the Fort Lee cliff where a young man was fatally injured.
- Essay urging brain-workers to take a two-months' summer rest—breathing pure air, bathing and exercising moderately—to renew health and creative power, quoting a writer in the Interior.
- Reports the $10,000 entertainment fund for the Indianapolis national meet (Aug. 9–12) is nearly realized, with information bureaus, decorations and an official book of information planned for visiting wheelmen.
- Surveys the design and relative merits of combination tandems for a man and a skirted woman, weighing the English-favored "lady back" arrangement—single steering and wind-shelter—against its awkwardness and the harder rear seat.
- Recounts what appears to be the first U.S. century run, made Dec. 19, 1880 by H. C. Schimpeler and O. M. Anderson of Louisville, Ky. on 58- and 52-inch ordinaries, covering 104 miles and finishing in a snow-storm.
- Illustrated tour, contributed by W. E. Miles, following the Charles river from Lief Ericson's statue in Boston out through Cambridge, Watertown and Waltham to Norumbega Park and Auburndale, crossing the river ten times (map on p.566).
- A humorous mock-essay on pavements and paving materials—flags, cobbles, wood and macadam—attributed to an English schoolboy and reprinted from the Surveyor.
- An experienced wheelman, No. 133,147, details his method for teaching beginners to mount and ride quickly—pushing the pedals, steering into a fall, never touching the pupil—with separate instructions for women riders.
- A nostalgic spring poem by associate editor Joe Lincoln, recalling boyhood sights and sounds awakened by sunbeams at his office window.
- Short item relaying a Canadian government road commissioner's tongue-in-cheek advice to leave the roads alone, since they could not get worse and Nature might improve them, with remarks favoring wide tires.
- The paper's advertising-criticism department announces May 6 prize winners (C. Carlton Smith, E. S. Hildreth and David W. Harts) and the rules for the May 27 "Ad. Critic" contest offering $5, $3 and $2 for the best letters judging the issue's advertisements.
- A temperance poem by associate editor Nixon Waterman, prompted by an Ohio Liquor League president's speech advocating the creation of an appetite for drink among boys.
- Gives four reasons single-tube tires are unpopular in Europe—foreigners' wish to inspect tire interiors, inferior shipments, harder roads causing punctures, and agents' lack of repair skill—plus C.R.C. double-century riding totals for 1897.
- Lead Good Roads essay reviewing twelve years of wheelmen's highway agitation since 1886 and arguing there is no conflict between building permanent hard highways and constructing smooth side-paths where roads remain unfit.
- Correspondence from member No. 173,628 endorsing land-value taxation "according to benefits conferred" as the only sound basis for road-building revenue, contending it would not burden the farmer; followed by a Michigan township's overseeing-cost example.
- The official department under editor Abbot Bassett: 1898–99 officers and standing committees, Renewal List No. 20, National Committee appointments, and chief-consul notices from the Michigan, Kentucky, Ohio, Oregon, Maryland, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Kansas, Iowa and Minnesota divisions.
- Chairman Albert Mott's Baltimore bulletin approving National Track Association contracts, noting expired suspensions (Penseyers, Larrissey, Turton), listing newly registered riders including John and Iver Lawson and James Bowler of Chicago, and accepting a Glens Falls circuit date; followed by a Stolen Wheels notice.
- President Isaac B. Potter announces a new benefit—reduced "club rates" on hundreds of periodicals ordered through Secretary Bassett—with the full alphabetical list of magazines and papers, the Indianapolis meet committee, and L.A.W. supplies and badges.
- The constitutionally required state-by-state list of membership applications received, running through Kansas, Massachusetts, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Wisconsin and other divisions, with names, addresses and clubs.
- Reader queries answered by the editor on where to obtain a League-emblem pattern for sofa pillows and on curing a bicycle squeak by graphiting the chain.
- A comic illustrated dialect letter signed "Shure Shott Sandy," recounting how he and "Goary Gus" bought cartridges, shot at a barn, and fled an angry farmer and his bulldog into a creek.