The Wheel: Journal of Bicycling, Vol 7, No 25
Articles in this issue
- Standing front-page notice of subscription rates and instructions to contributors, asking readers to report address changes, to separate editorial correspondence from matter for publication, to sign full name and nom de plume, and to address all business to The 'Cycling Publishing Company, Box 444, 21 Park Row.
- Front-page run of short editorial news and gossip paragraphs: Henry E. Ducker the Springfield 'boss'; the 'Big Four' tour cities of Chicago, Buffalo, Boston and New York; the Racing Board awarding Springfield the ten-mile championship; John S. Prince's record 39-second quarter mile against Morgan at New Orleans and plans to race trotters; the rumored L.A.W. presidential contest between Stephen Terry and Burley B. Ayers; Thomas Stevens reaching Cheyenne on his transcontinental ride; Karl Kron's road-book subscription list reaching 2,595; and the Massachusetts Bicycle Club's mileage statistics.
- Detailed technical description of the new Columbia two-track tricycle from Pope Manufacturing Company, covering its 48-inch driving wheels, Wallace's compensating gear and dwarf steering head, Serrel contractile rubber tires, spiral rack-and-pinion steering, double band brake, and weldless tubular steel frame, priced at $160.
- New York correspondent reports on the spring rush at cycle dealers, the arrival of English agents H. W. Gaskell for the Coventry Machinists Company and W. B. Everett for Singer & Co., and Karl Kron's subscription campaign for his road book reaching 2,595 names with new subscribers from Switzerland and seven English towns.
- Boston notes including the Massachusetts Bicycle Club's forthcoming reception in full-dress uniform, Captain E. G. Whitney promoting the Big Four tour with seventeen names enrolled, Fred Sewell joining Vanumburg's circus with a Columbia bicycle, and a 64-inch Rudge roadster on exhibition at Stoddard Lovering's.
- Philadelphia-area correspondent covers H. S. Wood's 3,165-mile season on a Victor tricycle and 58-inch Light Rudge, improvements to the new Rudge Light Roadster, Saturday road rides by Germantown Club members Frank Read and G. D. Gideon, and Ewing L. Miller's work on L.A.W. championship medal dies.
- Narrative poem by 'P.' describing a desperate bicycle dash of ten miles to reach a gravely ill bride, outpacing a physician on horseback and arriving within thirty minutes in time to help save her life.
- Announcement of the second annual race meeting of the Citizens Bicycle Club on Friday evening, April 17, 1885, at the Knickerbocker Roller Skating Rink, 63rd Street and 3rd Avenue, New York, featuring one-mile bicycle, tricycle, tandem, safety, and roller-skating events open to amateurs with gold and silver medal prizes.
- Review of the enlarged April issue of Outing magazine, noting its four new serials including Thomas Stevens' 'Across America on a Bicycle' illustrated by W. A. Rogers, Julian Hawthorne's novel 'Love—or a Name,' and a group of letters on preservation of the Adirondack Forests by Charles Dudley Warner, Gen. Francis A. Walker, President Andrew D. White of Cornell, and others.
- Club election results from the Keystone Club (president George A. Lyon), Missouri Bicycle Club (president Louis Chawvent), Maryland club (president S. T. Clark, 107 members, $700 in bank, season record of 913 miles in 40 runs), Oskaloosa Iowa Wheel Club, Salem Bicycle Club renaming itself the Fenwick Wheelmen, and clubs in Springfield Ohio, Williamsport and Wilkesbarre Pennsylvania.
- Full three-day race programme for the Springfield Bicycle Club's annual tournament at Hampden Park, September 8–10, 1885, listing professional and amateur bicycle, tricycle, tandem, and safety events including a one-mile professional sweepstake championship of the world with a $500 purse and $100 entrance fee, plus committee and officer appointments.
- A song in praise of the bold 'cycler who races for love and fame, dashes past all rivals to win the prize, and is greeted with a smile by his sweetheart at the finish.
- Letter from H. F. Fuller, secretary of the Big Four Tour in Chicago, requesting that participants in the 100-mile amateur road race between Coburg and Kingston on July 9 supply personal and equipment details via printed postal cards recording date, distance, riding time, road conditions, and wheel specifications.
- Extended column on the roller-skating craze, covering cyclist W. D. Wilmot receiving a $50 gold medal from the Pacific Skating Club after performing at multiple San Francisco rinks, the signed articles between William Donovan and Lenneth A. Skinner of Boston for a 142-hour roller-skating race for $1,000 a side, and the overlap between cycling and skating communities including Dan Canary's fancy riding.
- Darkly comic parody verse offering a tricycle for sale at half price beside the beautiful corpse of a lady cyclist killed flying a hill, her C. T. C. badge on her breast after a beautiful cropper and smash.