The Cycle, Vol 1, No 7
Articles in this issue
- The Cycle criticises the National Cyclists' Union for suspending unnamed racing men, allowing them to defy the order and then quietly removing the suspension — contrasting this timid inaction with the L.A.W. Racing Board's open and decisive enforcement of the amateur rules.
- A letters section gathering reader correspondence on several topics: the sociable versus the tandem for lady riders; fear of English ball-bearing patent suits; Karl Kron's forthcoming road book; a bicycle-trading arithmetic puzzle; the amateur-professional question; a mechanics'-fair demonstration of wheel-speed paradoxes; chemical versus mechanical hand-cleaning for cyclists; the N.Y. and N.J. Team Road Racing Association's proposed 12-June course; and advice on ladies' felt hats for cycling.
- Captain Peck of the Massachusetts Club announces a series of runs from 13 to 31 May 1886, including breakfast runs, moonlight rides to Chestnut Hill and Echo Bridge, and an all-day run to Lynn for the races at the new track, with visiting wheelmen invited to join.
- The L.A.W. Racing Board declares seven named wheelmen — including Reuben A. Punnett, Fred Russ Cook, S. G. Whittaker, and others — to be professionals expelled from the League, while suspending two more until 30 May and withdrawing all charges against two others.
- A notice reviewing Miss Minna Caroline Smith's new volume of twenty-five poems, "In Fruitful Lands," published by William B. Howland and sold by Cupples, Upham & Co., Boston, praising its fresh-air flavor and welcoming it from a writer known to cyclists through her contributions to Outing.
- A St. Louis wheelman writes to the Racing Board chairman proposing to retain the amateur rule only as a race-entry qualification rather than a condition of League membership, with trophies rather than money prizes directing ambitious men toward the professional ranks over time.
- A column of short news items on the approaching Boston L.A.W. Meet: hotel arrangements, reduced rail fares, the League banquet at the Vendome, Racing Board entry policy, and miscellaneous notes on riders, clubs, and coming events.
- A story, drawn from the Boston Globe, of how M.I.T. juniors preparing for a tug-of-war had to shed twenty-four pounds under strict training; finding themselves still over the limit the night before, they fasted until the weigh-in and then slipped away to eat between heats, outwitting their sophomore opponents.
- A miscellany of brief cycling notes: a comic verse about a spring header, Speechly's outright win of the Surrey Cup, plans for a Vicksburg cycling tournament, the St. Louis lantern parade, the death of Chicago wheelman Felix Ribolla, Secretary Aaron's health leave, and various club and racing items.
- Racing news covering the opening day of the Schock–Prince six-day Minneapolis championship (Prince leading 185 miles to Schock's 179), a New York college mile race, T. W. Eck's quarter-mile match against a trotter, the fifty-mile English championship won by H. O. Duncan, and results from several other American road and track events.
- Reports from the Massachusetts Bicycle Club's last monthly meeting — three new members admitted, a $200 contribution voted toward the League Meet, a resolution condemning the "Screamer" device, and Daniel Colbath's appointment as librarian — followed by officers and membership figures for clubs in Omaha, Wheeling, Canton, Middletown, Wilkesbarre, and several other cities.
- A dated calendar of cycling races, road races, club runs, and meetings from May through July 1886, including the L.A.W. Boston Meet (27–31 May), the Lynn Cycle Club Track Association opening tournament on Memorial Day, and events in New York, Colorado, Montreal, and other cities.