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Ad Rates / Articles / Classified Ads / Editorial / Home / Links / Showtime   Bikes big - in love and war   List Jim Trautman Next     On a bicycle built for two   By Jim Trautman Remember the song written in 1892 by Harry Daere, Daisy Bell?   Daisy, Daisy, give me your answer, do, I'm half crazy all for the love of you It won't be a stylish marriage, I can't afford a carriage, but you'd look sweet on the seat of a bicycle built for two   On Daere’s arrival at Ellis Island, New York, from England, the customs officer who charged him a fee to bring in his bicycle remarked, “It’s lucky you did not bring a bicycle for two - it would have cost you double.”   Daere wrote the song and it was an instant hit when sung by Jennie Lindsay at the Atlantic Gardens Restaurant in the Bowery area of New York City.   The song and its image and message have survived for over 120 years. Rent a copy of the famous Walt Disney cartoon short of 1950 and hear the song as Donald Duck goes “Crazy over Daisy.”   One of the most popular pennants sold at Disneyland features Mickey Mouse on his high wheeler talking to Minnie Mouse on Main Street. Of course, Walt Disney had a love for the simpler times in America and the scene is straight out of that period.   The bicycle as a mode of transport and recreation continues to thrive in 2011, in spite of some politicians’ belief that only automobiles should control any part of the roadway.   A classic 1901 photo taken during the victory celebration at the end of the Boer War shows Toronto's Yonge Street with electric street cars and hundreds of people with their bicycles.   One of the most valuable early 3-D stereoscope cards is a scene at the Brigham Young compound in Utah depicting armed guards holding bicycles. The same scene pictured five years earlier had guards with horses.   Today, the prime minister of Norway continues to bicycle to his office, followed by his security detail, also on bicycles.   The first bicycle craze began in 1866 when velocipede rinks were built in many provinces and bicycles were available for rental. But it was not until the 1890s that bicycles became the main means of personal transportation in Canada and the United States and remained as a permanent part of the culture of North American society.   With mass production, the price of a bicycle decreased and it became affordable to the new emerging middle class. Women saw it as a small way out of the restrictive norms of the fading Victorian Age.   The 1890s brought forth the modern bicycle, with pneumatic tires, gear and chain systems and opened the door to a sport. Prior to this period, the majority of bicycles were high wheelers. These penny farthings were very difficult to mount and dangerous to ride.   As with most fads, the turn of the century witnessed a glut in bicycles and sales dropped. This was due largely to the new demand for automobiles. Until 1910, approximately 40,000 a year were being turned out and 1,700 people were employed in the manufacturing. In Canada, the major company was the Canadian Cycle and Motor Company, or CCM.   World War I brought about the start of a new Golden Age for the bicycle. On the home front, with gasoline rationed, the main mode of transportation was once again on two wheels.   On the war front, the cavalry horse had been replaced not by the automobile or tank, but by battalions on bicycles. The French employed cycle battalions in mass formations and the Canadian Army followed suit.   The Canadian Corps of Cyclists fought at Ypres, Vimy Ridge, Passchendacle and was the first unit across the Rhine in late 1918. The bicycle was equipped in the same manner that a horse would be: bed roll on the front and a rifle sling on the side of the bike. The radio man had the heavy radio attached to the back of his bike.   Collectibles from this unit are sought after since it was so specialized and the artifacts are rare since the equipment was left behind at the end of the war. Not one bicycle made it back to Canada. The rationale was it cost too much money to ship the material home.   The French and Canadian units on bikes were not the first. That landmark belonged to the African-American soldiers stationed at Fort Missoula, Montana, in 1897. Just to prove it was possible, they traveled from Montana to St. Louis, Missouri, a journey of 2,000 miles and six weeks duration. Even though such feats proved possible, the U.S. Bicycle Corps disappeared into history.   The 1920s witnessed professional bicycle races. We tend to think of the famous Tour de France, but there were indoor six-day races.   William “Torchy” Peden became a bike star. “Torchy” was his nickname due to his flaming red hair. Besides prize money, the CCM Company employed Peden and other racers to advertise their bicycles. Also employed was Art Spencer, another famous Canadian racer.   Bike ads focused on kids, asking Mom and Dad to get them the new CCM “track” or “road racer”. The newly emerging radio found in nearly every home became an advertising arm of the company.   One print ad features “Torchy” Peden with a microphone in hand, “Calling all fathers, “Torchy” Peden, calling all fathers. Hello there Dad! Remember way back long ago when you were a boy? You got a bike, remember how thrilled you were?”   Other ads featured professionals riding bikes and the biggest business to employ their use was the telegraph company’s messenger boy. One newspaper feature in the mid 1930s declared, “Montreal police took to their bicycles in an effort to curb two wheeled violators who ignored the rules.”   World War II increased the use of bicycles. Once again, on the home front and the war front. Newsreel footage of air bases in the period of 1939-45 usually showed pilots, crews, and others on bikes getting to their aircraft.   The Canadian landing craft on D-Day at Juno Beach were filled with bicycles and a special foldup one had been developed for the parachute troops. The Japanese Army employed columns of bicycles to outflank the enemy. In the Philippines, Singapore, the Malayan Peninsula.   A high-ranking Japanese Army officer remarked, “to Britain’s dear money spent on excellent paved roads and to cheap Japanese bicycles, we thank them.”   The 1947 Italian movie the Bicycle Thief showed how important and valuable a bicycle in post-war Italy was.   “Simple, realistic tale of working man whose job depends on his bicycle and the shattering week he spends with his young son after it is stolen.”   The bicycle was not only for transportation, but necessary for his job of putting up posters. The tragic ending of the movie is when he resorts to attempting to steal another individual's bicycle. He is chased and caught by the mob. His young son witnesses the entire scene. A movie poster from the film sells for several thousand dollars.   After the war, the Baby Boom created an entire new generation that wanted a bicycle. Growing up in the U.S., I had a Schwinn with saddlebags, lights on the wheels, streamers - and we lived on the third floor of an apartment house. I got my exercise riding the bike, Mom got hers carrying it up the stairs.   Bicycles were employed as prizes in contests and it seemed almost every issue of the comic books, from 1950 onward, featured a bicycle ad or had schemes to sell cards, seeds, etc. to make enough points to earn a bicycle.   Over the years, the bicycle has been employed as a work and pleasure vehicle and culturally a means to new freedom.   The collectible area for the material is unlimited. There is one branch of collecting that is focused on anything with a bicycle in it: stereoscope cards, posters, advertising, photos.   Other areas involve crossover appeal: Disney material with a bicycle, movies, picture cards and of course the advertising, which features a baseball, or hockey star. This material has appeal for not only the image of the bicycle, but who the player in the ad is.   Material was often issued as a premium on cereal boxes. In the 1950s and later, there were licence plates for your bicycle. Your name on a licence plate, or in one year, a complete set of every state and province could be ordered for a set number of box tops and a small fee.   Of course, the other area of collecting is the bicycles themselves. Unfortunately, in recent years the value on this type of collectible has decreased. But in the 120-year history of the bicycle, there are more than enough areas of collecting depending on your interest and price range. A new expanding area is period photos that feature bikes in a historical context.   Happy riding and good collecting.   Photos   1 - Bikes galore on crowded Yonge Street in Toronto, early 1900s   2 - WW1 recruitment poster for Canadian Corps of Cyclists   3 - WW1 member of the CCC   Jim Trautman is a freelance writer residing in Orton, Ontario.       Return to top of page   This Is Livin' Publishing © 2011 581 8th Line West, RR1 Hastings, ON, K0L 1Y0 Phone/Fax: 705-696-1833   webmaster