May 31, 2021
My love of bicycles and why I am doing this
My childhood and background
I’ve enjoyed being on bicycles from an early age. My earliest memories are of a red tricycle in my small-town Missouri backyard. I rode that thing everywhere – even on the grass when I ran out of sidewalk.
Eventually, I got my first actual bicycle. A red Schwinn Stingray knockoff from Montgomery Ward (I think).
There were others as I got older. I don’t remember this black three-speed well, but I think the former red not-a-Stingray was still rolling with my younger sister, Allison.
So many I don’t have pictures of. One was a rusty 1950s single-speed (complete with fake gas-tank) that I delivered papers on in Indiana. I don’t remember where we got it – possibly after another bike was stolen, but it must have weighed 50 lbs (without the papers). Credit my current leg-strength to that bike!
Eventually came the day I got my first 10-speed – a Raleigh Rampar. Rampar were the cheaper versions of Raleighs, but I couldn’t afford the Fuji I wanted from another shop. I rode that all over the cornfields of central Indiana, to “Bike Camp” at the church-camp I attended most summers, and even in a school bicycle race. Someone threw tacks onto the track and my Tour-de-France aspirations were shattered. The movie “Breaking Away” filmed in nearby Bloomington was a big inspiration for me.
There was a several-year hiatus when I entered the military – but my love of bikes was rekindled in Milwaukee – so many good trails, charity rides, and centuries to join. I even began commuting the 7 miles to work there.
I’ve bought and sold a couple-dozen over the years, restored some, and ruined a couple. My first multi-day ride was two years ago, when I attended the 30th Tour-de-Nebraska. Five days of cool, windy, sometime rainy weather, and sleeping in tents every night, but I had a blast!
I began thinking about ways to do longer rides. I don’t have the time to do a full cross-country trip during the 8-week break I have from my school job each summer, but eventually decided to do it in chunks. This is the first one. Denver to Milwaukee. If all goes well, I might try San Francisco to Denver next summer, or maybe a more eastern route. More about this year’s route in my next post.
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I had a friend who had a "Bronco": styled after off-road motorcycles, also with a fake gas tank. IIRC it also had a "shock absorber" on the back end, which was needed since the "seat" was unpadded hard cold steel.
I bet the thing also weighed in on the "hefty" end of the spectrum.
Does this sound familiar? I've never known anyone else who's heard of the Bronco, much less had one.
2 years ago
2 years ago