The Wheelmen's Gazette, Vol 1, No 6
Articles in this issue
- Pope Manufacturing Co. announces the Columbia Safety bicycle has exceeded expectations in the market, reporting that demand has outpaced supply, and introduces the Kirkpatrick Saddle, now available in large stock after previous shortages.
- Pope Manufacturing Co. details the quality controls applied to Columbia tires, arguing that pure gum rubber and careful inspection make their tires more elastic and durable than composition-stock alternatives.
- The Hartford Travelers Insurance Company advertises accident policies for bicycle riders, offering $1,000 coverage with $5 weekly indemnity for just $5 per year, explicitly covering bicycle riding.
- A New York dealer on West 59th Street advertises storage lockers and repair services for cyclists, handling the New Rapid, Humber, Kangaroo, American Star, and other machines.
- Freeman Lillibridge of Rockford, Illinois promotes his adjustable saddle as the only one on the market that can be changed in shape or position at all, suitable for all bicycle and tricycle makes.
- An extended technical endorsement from The Cyclist is reprinted explaining the Grip-Fast rim and tire system and the benefits of the ball-bearing head that can run six months without oiling.
- Stoddard, Lovering and Co. continue their detailed promotion of the Rudge Humber Tandem, emphasising its suitability for ladies, comfortable steering, and convertibility to a single tricycle.
- An editorial denounces the National Cyclists' Union's refusal to let English amateurs cross the Atlantic to race American promateurs, arguing the ban ('Not at home') sets international cycling back years and accuses the N.C.U. of caving to its own makers' amateurs while pretending otherwise.
- Writing from Paris, Ernest Smith contrasts France's exclusively professional racing scene — naming Duncan, De Civry, Dubois and Medinger — with the rigid amateurism of England, and recounts a farcical club handicap near Paris that gave one rider a three-hundred-yard head start in a mile sprint.
- Reprints the National Cyclists' Union ruling barring its amateurs from racing American promateurs, followed by London Wheeling's rebuttal accusing English 'amateurs' of the same maker-sponsorship hypocrisy the Union condemns in America's promateur class.
- Reports the funeral of bicyclist George E. Weber of East Burlington, who died of typhoid fever at Smithville, describing the floral tributes sent by the Springfield Bicycle Club and racing men and his burial at St. Paul's Roman Catholic church.
- A Paris letter describes summer touring by the Lyons Club and the Club de Cyclistes de Paris, an American-made Columbia bicycle exhibited in Paris, and the 100-kilometre French championship road race won by Dubois of Paris ahead of Boyer, Lanlan and Charles Terront.
- Chicago correspondent 'Verax' reports club sentiment against the L.A.W./A.C.U. racing feud, profiles the newly formed Illinois Cyclers club and racers Roe and Bowbeer, and notes Gormully & Jeffery's booming local factory and dealers Vowell and Maynard selling Victor and Star machines.
- A Philadelphia correspondent signed 'Chris.' previews the Springfield tournament's importance to American cycling, reports on racers George D. Gideon, his brother Sam Gideon and Louis Hill of the Pennsylvania Bicycle Club, and describes W. A. Stadelman and Frank Kohler's hill-climbing feats on Conshohocken hill.
- The official prize list and special one-mile 'World's Championship' race conditions for the September 14-17, 1886 tournament at Hampden Park, listing promateur, amateur and professional events across bicycle, tricycle and tandem classes; entries close September 7 with secretary Sanford Lawton.
- An essay signed 'Independent' argues judicious touring is as valuable to cycling as racing, promoting good-fellowship and health over the professionalism of the racing path, and warns that the reckless 'scorcher' does a disservice to touring's reputation.
- A letter from Karl Kron (Lyman Hotchkiss Bagg) updates readers on the slow progress of his book 'Ten Thousand Miles on a Bicycle' and denounces the Orange Wanderers club of New Jersey for threatening touring wheelmen with a '$5 fine or thirty days imprisonment.'
- Frank Aloy Egan satirizes sensationalist cycling journalism through the fictional editor 'Mr. Amateur Pencilpush' of the 'Pedal Pusher's Own,' who prints contradictory items about Princess Beatrice and 'Mrs. James Brown Potterry' to please advertisers.
- Reprinted from Outing, Thomas Stevens's round-the-world account describes his passage from Yuzgat toward Koehne in the Sivas Vilayet of Ottoman Armenia, an armed Circassian guard, and an impromptu reunion of the Armenian Pampasian-Pamparsan family that he joins along the road.
- Reprinted from the Boston Herald, a young bicyclist rides his machine along the narrow stone coping of the 125-foot-high Cabin John Bridge near Washington, D.C., terrifying picnicking onlookers before completing the ride unharmed.
- An untitled item attributed to 'Verax, in Sporting Journal' discusses L.A.W. president Dr. Beckwith declaring the Massachusetts chief consulship vacant in a move against this Gazette's own editor, Henry E. Ducker, recalling Ducker's earlier feud with Fred Jenkins.
- P. C. Darrow's serialized touring account follows a bicycle trip from Hartford through Berlin and Meriden, Connecticut, a drenching rainstorm and muddy roads, New York's Central Park and Riverside Drive, and up the Hudson through Poughkeepsie and Rhinebeck toward Albany, including a tandem crash near Rhinebeck.
- Saml. T. Clark & Co.'s multi-page advertisement for the New Rapid bicycle's True Tangent Wheel is backed by rider testimonials, including I. C. Canfield of the Maryland Bicycle Club, C. M. Phelps of the Harlem Wheelmen (who conquered the Fordham Heights hill), and J. M. Critchlow of the Beaver Valley Wheelmen.
- A serialized ghost story ('Chapter I. — The Man') by 'President Bates' follows the Rev. Pyromander Sadiron, a Methodist mission preacher in rural Ontario, who is shaken by a spectral vision of a woman coasting toward him on a tricycle while riding between two revival meetings.
- A correspondent details the Hagerstown Bicycle Club's first Western Maryland bicycle meet on July 5, including Mayor R. J. Halm's welcome, a parade of clubs from Washington, Baltimore and West Virginia led by chief marshal J. Kemp Bartlett, and a banquet attended by ex-Gov. W. T. Hamilton and Col. H. Kyd Douglas.
- A correspondent signed 'Cycle' complains of open beer-drinking in his German-influenced town, describes facing down a buggy driver who nearly ran him down on the pike, and reports on Reading Bicycle Club racer Wilhelm's wins over Hugh J. High at Pottstown and at the Newcastle, Pa. races.
- Announces the Lynn Cycle Club Track Association's tournament at Lynn, Mass., September 23-25, 1886, under A.C.U. rules, listing amateur, promateur and professional bicycle, tricycle and tandem races for prizes ranging from cash purses to gold watches; entries close with secretary E. M. Bailey.
- Notice for the New Jersey Cycling and Athletic Association's tournament at Roseville Station, Newark, September 30-October 2, 1886, on a new third-of-a-mile track with $2,000 in prizes under A.C.U. rules, managed by Frederick Jekiss of Oraton Hall.
- A New Orleans correspondent reports nearly two hundred riders now cycling on St. Charles Avenue, credits L. U. Munger and the New Orleans-to-Boston tourists for the sport's local growth, and previews the L.A.W. meet of August 26-27 featuring racers Hughes, Hill and Guillotte.
- A column of short cycling-world items reports Abbot Bassett accepting the Springfield tournament referee post, C. E. Titchener's 2:56 3/4 mile at Scranton, R. P. Gormully sailing home from Liverpool, the New Rapid's popularity on the Pacific coast, and visiting racer W. H. Langdown of Christchurch, New Zealand.
- Local club notes report G. S. Benedict's appointment as Hartford Wheel Club secretary-treasurer, Postmaster Palmer's run to 'the Landin'' and Dumpling Pond on a Facile, and the 'Scorch Club's' watch on ripening roadside cider mills.
- Previews the Connecticut Bicycle Club's September 8-9 tournament at Charter Oak Park, naming expected competitors Hendee, Rowe, Burnham, Knapp, Ives, Rhodes, Stone, Gaskell, Rich, Foster and Valentine, and describing the anticipated 500-rider parade with Weed's band.
- A schedule of coming race meetings through October — Buffalo, Massillon, Hartford, Pittsfield, Springfield, Lynn, Newark, St. Louis — followed by detailed results from the Weedsport, N.Y. and Scranton, Pa. bicycle club meets naming winners J. R. Rheubottom, C. E. Titchener and W. H. Stone.
- Reports on the new Roseville, N.J. track's preparation for the Orange Wanderers' race meet, naming racers Brown and Crist of Washington and A. B. Rich training there ahead of the fall tournaments, and outlines the three-day program for the September 30-October 2 tournament.
- Reprinted from the Springfield Republican, an editorial argues America's fall tournaments can thrive without English amateurs given the Springfield Bicycle Club's record-holding Hampden Park track, Col. Pope's well-funded Columbia racing team, and the National Cyclists' Union's ban on its own amateurs competing here.