Contrasts in Rider Attire - Women Century Riders 1897

The photos below are taken from the C.R.C. Manual compiled by Will L. Krietenstein for the Century Road Club of America in 1898. In the middle are a number of posed photos of century ride champions, including two women.


More manly attire, as shown on this page


More traditional attire, as shown on this page

Since the photos were posed in two different photographers' studios, one wonders if the second rider actually rode with such a long coat and that particular sort of wind-catching hat; still, one sees other photos of women on bikes in similar attire at that time (but not, presumably, riding 100 mile intervals). The first rider's attire is noteworthy for its practicality. One senses that this may even be her own bike that she has brought to the photography session, with its tool bag attached under the top tube. (I assume that in the first one the bike is a photographer's prop and not her own since it was taken in St. Louis and she was the champion of Minnesota.)

Given that these images are captured from Google book scans rendered in poor grayscale, they are not too bad, I think.

Merry Christmas 2011

Young Bicycle Messengers From ~100 Years Ago

Lewis Hine took thousands of photographs that make up the National Child Labor Committee Collection that was used to document terrible conditions for working children - the photographs were used to support arguing that laws should protect children.

The photos below are from the Library of Congress collection and are just a few of 159 at the Library of Congress (although not all show bicycles . . . ) - they are quite amazing.


Group of Western Union Messengers in Norfolk, Va. 1911


Leo Day, Postal Telegraph Messenger, 12 years old, and a very knowing lad. Tampa, Florida. 1911


Isaac Boyett, "I'm de whole show." Waco, Texas. 1913

The caption continues: The twelve year old proprietor, manager and messenger of the Club Messenger Service, 402 Austin Street, Waco. The photo shows him in the heart of the Red Light district where he was delivering messages as he does several times a day. Said he knows the houses and some of the inmates. Has been doing this for one year, working until 9:30 P.M. Saturdays. Not so late on other nights. Makes from six to ten dollars a week.

Long Freight Fuji Bike on National Mall

The National Mall is hardly a place to see many hipster bikes. While jogging at lunch I snapped a photo of this "longbike" with my cell phone camera. On the way back, we saw another one near the Supreme Court! Now I'm wondering if it wasn't the same bike. . .


Fuji frame, Xtracycle platform bike

At the moment Fuju does not have its own Xtracycle platform bike (like the Surly Big Dummy) so this is a custom modification of a standard frame - a mountain bike, in fact, with a disk brake and full suspension fork on the front, and the person has added a fender as well. With the Xtracycle add-on to the frame, the freight-carrying bags and the childseat, the thing probably weighs 50+ pounds. Not to mention that NYC-style chain.


Fortunately Washington has few steep hills

Small Change Where 14th St Bridge Meets GW Trail

National Park Service had a bit of asphalt added to make this better

This is where the "off ramp" from the outbound 14th St Bridge trail/path meets the north-south GW Parkway trail. The NPS apparently realized that for cyclists the narrow "T" intersection was not working particularly well (which it wasn't) and added some asphalt to ease things.

By the way, in the above photo, it isn't that the cyclist (heading left-to-right) is incredibly fast so much as the camera is incredibly slow.


Looking south - extent of added asphalt more visible

It isn't clear if they are done adding turf or if there was some particular reason to add turf right next to the path, perhaps to make things safer/better for bikes that run off the trail?


I suppose they will put it back up, but I liked seeing the "dismount" sign this way

Parking in the Bike Lane -Moscow

Moscow site with nothing but photos of cars parked in what is the first dedicated bike lane in Moscow, near Moscow State University. The person posting the photos, on a more or less daily basis, is a chemistry student who one assumes is doing this as some sort of protest.

I think acclimating Russian drivers to cycling will be tough.

Police Unity Tour on GW Trail

Sunday, mid-day - despite the excellent weather, not really that many riders out - any many were part of a local event supporting a national "Police Unity Tour" (by bike). The riders had event numbers on their clothes.


Came up upon this fellow heading north on the GW trail near National Airport


Riding with gun

I guess maybe this is a work-related activity? I don't see the need for this guy to be riding with his sidearm. I wasn't able to work out what jurisdiction he was from.

Cyclists in Stockholm, 1948

Photo from the Stockholm Transport Museum Commons in Flickr

Alas, for now it is the only one with bicycles.

Overdue Bicycle Parked at Library Branch

Bicycle parked at Aurora Hills Branch Library, Arlington VA

You can't leave your bike locked up at one location for more than five days, or it gets removed. To where is a bit vague.


Tag on bicycle parked at Aurora Hills Branch Library, Arlington VA

I guess we won't have any books published like Bicycles Locked to Poles with its photos of bicycles in New York City (in various states of disassembly, mostly attached to poles with chains as heavy or heavier than the bikes themselves).

Belgian Bicycles, 1910s (Photo)

Newly added to the Library of Congress Flickr collections online

Taken near the Belgian town of Diest, presumably during World War I. From the Bain News Service collection. As presented by the Library of Congress on its site, it isn't possible to "pull out" the images with bicycles much of the time, but users add tags in Flickr that help with that.


"France - Cyclists of Army" - another Bain photograph


The Austrians had some bikes, too.

Plastic Bike Design

Recycled plastic bicycle design - this seems pretty clever but I have my doubts as to how pleasant it would be to ride.

None of the comments seem to have been made by anyone who knows much about bicycle design.

The first thing I see is that the steering tube is quite upright, which might be fine for a racing bike but for something like this, it would make it twitchy and requiring more attention to control. It doesn't help that the handlebars are so short.

Can this really not have any metal in it? It would be pretty amazing if you could have crank arms (that connect the drive system to the pedals) that are just made out of plastic that would support an adults weight and transfer power reliably.

It appears that the pedals are relatively spread apart - usually there isn't much variance in the distance left and right of center that the pedals are. A larger distance ("Q factor") is apparently less efficient.

Is the height of the seat adjustable? Doesn't seem like it. That's probably the biggest problem.

Best Bike Parking - for Some

Four spots set aside for three police bikes

In my office building on Capitol Hill, we are protected by federal police. This parking lot has 24 slots for bicycle parking, half in the center and half at one end of the garage. Through some sort of unspoken tradition, the bicycle commuters know who parks where. This has been upset by the police taking four of the 12 spots near the center in order (at least for now) to park three bikes. (One of the bikes is made by "Smith & Wesson" - well known for making bikes! Stop or I'll shoot you with my bike!) This has completely upset the bicycle commuter ecology right in the middle of the prime riding season. (Well, ok with the heat wave, maybe not entirely prime in the usual sense.) So the police have three bikes on the four closest most convenient slots and the staff who are bike commuters have crammed ten, eleven, etc bikes into eight slots to see how much paint they can scrape off each others' bikes.

These police bikes are locked up with the most absurd chains and padlocks - you would think they were locking them up in some high crime area and not in a garage guarded like a fort.

PS - I thought perhaps this gift of parking places to the police might put us out of compliance with the DC "for every ten spots for cars, one for bikes" law but they count the slots on bike racks in front of the building. 95 percent of the car parking is in a garage and 75 percent of the bike parking is outdoors. Oh well.

Nice Steel Track Bikes for a Sunday

Fellow had these two bikes on his truck for riding at Hains Point (in Washington, DC).


Old school drilled holes in rims to lighten - and enhance appearance



French 1960s Abel Borne track bike - weighs only 13 pounds

Steel is real! But can be light.

Fellow said this was one of only 26 such track bikes produced.

Diplomats Need Cycling Exercise (1912)

Article in the Washington Herald from 1912 describes cycling tour in France of socialites, accompanied by an assistant secretary of state, Alvey Adee, who was noted for his cycling and cycling tours in Europe.


From the society page of the paper

Gen. Thackary believes that the whole consular corps should take a holiday on wheels for the improvement of the diplomatic service. For it would counteract the bad results of a life necessarily sedentary.

Alvey Adee at age 72 and his bike in Washington, 1914
Photo from the Library of Congress

More information about Adee.


Adee riding in Washington
Photo from the Library of Congress

Description of Adee's diplomatic career in "Washington close-ups" By Edward George Lowery, 1921.

Wheels & Bikes at Shirlington

Bike rack in front of the Shirlington public library

So, why the locked up "extra" wheels at this bike rack? How did this happen? (These photos taken early Saturday morning before they are obscured by other parked bikes.)


Bike rack in the Harris Teeter parking garage at Shirlington

100 yards/meters or so away, we have this sad Mongoose that has lost its wheels - perhaps they are locked in front of the library!

Patriotic Recumbent Bike

On the bike trail along Four Mile Run, Arlington VA

I don't really understand why he isn't hot in there, although I suppose some air circulates from below and it is somewhat open in front of him to let hot air out.

Bicycles Expressing Some Opinions

All free space covered in bumper stickers

Mostly Arlington is not a place where one sees lots of cars (and trucks) plastered with bumper stickers - or bicycles either. This one in Shirlington is an exception.

14th St Bridge to GW Parkway Bike Trail Detour Still Wanted

Fence opened allowing access to what was a temporary detour

When construction work closed off the regular route (now restored - see photo below) a presumably temporary detour was put in that was eventually paved (see photo above). Now that a detour isn't needed, the Park Service has installed temporary fencing along the top of short "cut-through" to prevent its further use, but people who like the idea of a shortcut (perhaps cyclists, perhaps walkers/runners) keep opening the fence up. Last night when I rode home, it was closed. By now I'm sure it's open again.


The USPS "authorized" route

It would make sense, I think, to have stairs (or something bicycles wouldn't try to use) instead of the old detour to pull some of the foot traffic away from the busy intersection (admittedly not busy at this time of the morning) shown in the photo above. In the meantime, we have this silly situation where there is a "sometimes" option that wasn't very good as a detour and isn't any better as a shortcut for combined bicycle-foot traffic.

I didn't get a photo of it, I'm sad to say, but one morning a cyclist had ridden up the cut-through only to realize that the fencing closed him off, and instead of disconnecting the fencing (or turning around), he had put his bike over the fence and was in the process of climbing over to join it. Hmm . . .

New Stop Sign, GW Bike Trail

New stop sign added for traffic coming off the 14th St Bridge (from DC) - sorry, lousy phone camera photo

A new stop sign has been added where traffic coming from DC on the 14th St Bridges meets the north-south George Washington Parkway bike trail. They have also added some helpful (I suppose) directional information - "trail north" and "trail south" for example.

The stop sign is in a somewhat unorthodox location - instead of being on the near side of the intersection, to the right, it is across the intersection, in the middle. I don't see that this clarifies the situation and it may just confuse things.


My favorite - "dismount before crossing"

For bike traffic northbound, there is a "dismount before crossing" sign, apparently pertaining to the humpback bridge a 100 yards on. The Park Service seems to have lots of these "dismount" signs to put up (to no purpose). Also, the sign is on the left side rather than the more conventional right side (presuming I am understanding who it is intended for correctly).

Aside from all this signage, this intersection is a mess for the kind of mixed cycling/walking/running going on here. Neither the north-south trail nor the one coming from the 14th St Bridge are wide enough.

Voice of America Covers DC Bike to Work

A good set of photographs from this month's Bike to Work day in Washington DC is on the Russian language VOA site - scroll down and the slide show launches. Knowledge of Russian not required.

As associated article in Russian isn't much for non-Russian speakers, but Google translate will render something like (but not exactly like) English - certainly it is understandable, if quirky.

Often in machine translation, the story becomes more dramatic in the telling, such as, "Move along the wide roads designed for a more dimensional and fast cars with gasoline engines - it's not only scary but dangerous. Therefore, local authorities began to pay greater attention to road safety. Cyclists immediately responded to these steps, rushing into the streets en masse."

I will be on the lookout for these cyclists storming the streets of DC.

(Not even slightly connected with bicycles, the translation business reminds me of the infamous Time article about Madonna's interview supposedly translated from English to Hungarian and back - which turns out to be an urban legend.)