Dreaming of the Past...
Not Living In It

by John Whiteley, President 1995-1996

April 2000

Yr. Obd’t Svt. was born thirty years too late. Those of you who know me know that I seem to be turned on by anything with wire wheels. There’s a 20-year old MG sports car (with the requisite wire wheels) sitting in the carport, and a small but growing stable of bicycles gracing various rooms in the house. And not a Spynergy wheel to be found. Yes, the thought has often crossed my mind of how growing up in the early part of the 20th Century would have been. My library has photo books of sports cars during the glory years of the British sports car, the years when a proper sports car had only two seats, a soft top, and 19-inch diameter road wheels. I have a good friend who owns, among other sports cars, a 1948 MG TC, British Racing Green and right-hand drive, of course. He has let me drive the car, and it’s a completely different experience from driving a modern car. There’s much more of a sense of being in touch with the road and the surrounding scenery, not to mention the waves and smiles you get from passing motorists!

And my dreams also drift to thoughts of growing up during the years when a bicycle was truly a transportation device, not just a fitness machine. Your faithful scribe has described himself as a "Retrogrouch," and with good reason. Those wire wheeled wonders leaning against various walls in the house? Not an STI shifter to be found. In fact, my favorite classic bicycle, the Condor which you have read about in these pages in past months, not only has Suntour downtube shifters, but also has metal toe clips and leather straps on its Campagnolo pedals.

So, as another long winter winds down and my mind starts turning to thoughts of springtime rides that are still a couple of months away (as this article is being written in mid-February) what is one to do? Well, Yr. Obd’t Svt. turns to a gem of a cycling magazine that he discovered through the pages of the Rivendell Reader (another classic cycling publication). My literary salvation comes from On the Wheel, a bi-monthly publication for the classic cyclist. (Not only does it restore my soul, but it is full of ideas for Sidelong Cycling articles!) The magazine has been reviewed previously in Sidelong Cycling, but the Jan/Feb 2000 issue has so many different articles of interest to a Retrogrouch that it bears mention again.

For example, there’s an article reprinted from a 1970’s edition of The New Yorker describing, very tongue in cheek, the new cyclist and his toys. The prices quoted in the article will make your heart bleed! How would you like to purchase a Schwinn Paramount, new, for $350? Or shoes for $10 to $25, cleats included? Of course, some things never change. New York was described as the bike theft capital of the world, with the admonition to "never chain your bike to anything that you don’t want stolen."

Another article describes an English cycle tourer in France during the summer of 1950. (Yr. Obd’t Svt. was 1 month old when this article was written!) For the cost of 19 pounds Sterling (about $90 then) the author toured France and Switzerland for three weeks, and his adventures are described with a typically dry British sense of humor. Such as when he tells about being kept awake all night by the squeals of a pig from a nearby farm, then eating his bacon with particular relish the next morning. Or how, after five miles of uneven cobblestones, at "each nerve-shattering, screaming, spine-jarring coarse crash I gave vent to picturesque Anglo-Saxonism learnt as a child from toiling ditch-diggers in my native Somerset. I did full credit to the limitless vocabularies of those great men."

On the Wheel then jumps from the France of 1950 to the France of 1999 for a description of the Paris-Brest-Paris Tour. This is a 750-mile tour that the leisurely riders complete in 90 hours. What better way to spend a winter evening by the fire than by dreaming of riding in this classic event, a sporting event that’s closed to professional riders so as to maintain its amateur flavor? The P-B-P is only held every four years, so the next tour will be in 2003. Start practicing now!

So if the winter blahs are getting you down or, if you’re like me and like to dream of the past while you live in the present, pick up a copy of On the Wheel. An annual subscription is only $20, and well worth it. Send your check to On the Wheel, 13028 Cypress Avenue, Sand Lake, MI, 49343.

And start dreaming

HFDF (Have Fun, Don’t Fall) John