Tuesday, July 24, 2018

SPINNING OUT OF THE PAST

I was surprised to receive an email from my nephew Larry, of Minot, North Dakota today.

He said he had just finished restoring a bicycle that belonged to my cousin Cherie.

He had retrieved it from a loft in a shed that had to be torn down after a flood a few years ago.

Cherie said she believed the bike dated back to around 1949.  

When she (who just celebrated another birthday) and I were 9 years old!


The bicycle had a police bicycle license on it that was dated 1956.

Larry said everything on he bike was original except for the tires and that it now rode as good as new.

However, that was when bikes were bikes and he said at 52-plus pounds it was really only good for riding downhill!

And here's the real treat for me - a photo of Cherie and her bike along with my only sibling, my brother Wayne, who will turn 85 in less than a week!


Something about those Norsky North Dakotans seems to keep them young at any age.

9 comments:


  1. That's a perfect Santa Monica Beach Cruiser. One of Cake's clients is a solar supplier and he put together a solar powered electric motor kit for bikes. Cherie could whiz right along the NoDak highways and byways. Your nephew did a great job on the restoration.

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  2. That bike is a beauty, except it looks like the rack on the back does not have one of those snappy holding things for school books...I guess that was a later technology.

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  3. I think I had that bike! It was called a Ben Hur. Weighted a ton, but there are batteries in that little spot light above the front tire which was a pretty cool thing to have. Mine was blue, also. Great photos!

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  4. Cool! I had a similar bicycle in the 60s, with streamers like that. I'm sure mine was a knock-off from Western Auto, and it was in green.

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  5. What a cool old bike! I bet it's valuable now. My mom used to have one similarly big and heavy, but we got rid of it somewhere along the line. No one ever rode it and it was in terrible shape.

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  6. A great job of restoration. The bike looks as good as new!

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