Not For Women--Or Anybody

When I was writing for a newspaper, a police precinct commander sold me something I haven't forgotten:  "Lucky for us that most criminals are stupid."

For many perps, their folly begins in thinking that they'll actually get away with what their misdeeds.  But for others, their foolishness shows in the ways they execute--or don't execute their offenses. 

I got to thinking about all of that because I think there's a parallel principle in making works of "art".  We are lucky, I believe, that most of the truly offensive stuff--you know, things that are racist, sexist, homophobic or otherwise show contempt for some group of people that did nothing to deserve it--is purely and simply bad.  And that is the reason why it is usually forgotten.


So why am I pontificating about virtue and virtu on a bike blog?, you ask. Great question.

Yesterday "The Retrogrouch" wrote about a bicycle displayed at the North American Handmade Bicycle Show (NAHBS).  Its builder, Allan Abbott, dubbed it "The Signorina."

With a name like that, you might expect a nicely-made women's city or commuter bike with some Italian pizzazz.  Instead, it's a not particularly well-made (for a handbuilt bike, anyway) machine that's supposedly built in the likeness of a naked woman.



So far it sounds like a silly novelty item, right?  But it doesn't seem like anything to get worked up about. Or does it?  

Now, I'm sure there are places where such a bike could not be ridden because it would offend the sensibilites of some people.  I'm not one of them:  I have no aversion to nudity, although I have to wonder whether anyone in his or her right mind would want to see me naked.

But I digress.  If you're going to use a human form, au naturel, in one of your creations, at least show it in all of its imperfect glory--the way, say, any number of painters, sculptors, photographers and writers have done.  Whatever its gender, size, colors, shape, age or state of alertness or weariness, make it a reflection of what we are, and aspire to.  Above all, make it living, human and organic.

The supposedly female form in Abbot's frame is none of those things.  If anything, it's plain creepy:  The "signorina" is on her "hands" and "knees"--and headless.  I'm sure there are people--a few of whom are cyclists or collectors--who are turned on by such degradation.  I guess I'm philistine and reactionary:  I'm not one of them.

But, to be fair, if "Retrogrouch" hadn't described it, I might have needed time and an extra look or two to discern the nude female form straddling the wheels.  Call me slow or un-hip if you must.  Even after reading about it on Adventure Journal  as well as Retrogrouch's blog, I'm still not convinced that the bike in any way--realist or abstract, linear or Cubist, Classical or Impressionist--evokes a female, or any other human, form.

In other words, it doesn't work as art.  Perhaps we should be thankful for that.  

Somehow I get the impression it's not such a great bike, either. 

Another Celt Blazes A New Path For Cycling--And Everyone

Now, on the day after St. Patrick's Day, I'm going to talk about another Celtic person in the world of cycling.

Unlike Sean Kelly, this person was from Scotland but lived in Ulster (a.k.a. Northern Ireland).  Another difference is that this person I'm about to mention never won any Tour jerseys or classics.  In fact, as far as I know, he never raced at all.  

But we should all be grateful to this person, who invented something that not only revolutionized (in every sense of the word) cycling, but the whole world. 

That last clue may have tipped you off.  Yes, this person's invention had to do with the wheel.  No, he didn't invent the wheel:  That came a few millenia earlier.  But what he did made the wheel--and the bicycle--versatile in ways no one could have previously imagined.

What's just as interesting is that this person not only was not a racer, he wasn't an engineer or a technical person.  In fact, he was a veterinary surgeon at the time he invented the thing I'm going to mention.

Early pneumatic tire.  From Dave's Vintage Bicycles

That thing was...the pneumatic tire.  Without it, bicycles are no faster than horse-drawn carriages--and wouldn't be able to traverse some of the terrain our bovine friends have trod for milennia. Ditto for automobiles:  They would have been all but useless, especially given the road conditions of around the time the gasoline-powered engine was invented.  And aircraft, at least as we know them, could not take off or land.

John Boyd Dunlop

 The man in question is John Boyd Dunlop.  As the story goes, his young son was prescribed cycling as a cure for a heavy cold.  Given the relative cost of bikes at that time, it took a pretty fair amount of audacity to complain that his tricycle--with hard rubber tires on iron wheels-- was uncomfortable.

No one knows exactly how Dunlop pere came up with the idea of bonding canvas together with liquid rubber to make an inflatable tube.  But he did and in 1888 he patented the idea--and, in the process used the word "pneumatic" for the first time.  

A local firm, W. Edlin and company, agreed to make casings for the new tubes and the following year, a well-known cyclist, Willie Hume, used the new tires to win a race at Cherryvale.  A paper manufacturer who was one of the spectators would buy Dunlop's patents a few years later.  By that time, he had moved to Dublin, where he manufactured bicycle frames in collaboration with a local firm, Bowden and Gillies.

Tour Green: Sean Kelly

Believe it or not, this was the jersey of a French cycling team.



So why does it look more like the flag of Ireland--or, at least, the way such a flag might look if it were designed by an Ulsterman?

The Sem-France Loire team raced from 1980 until 1983.  Directeur sportif Jean de Gribaldy formed it by taking the French part of the Belgian Flandria-Ca-Va Seul-Senair (Try saying that three times fast) team after Flandria withdrew its sponsorship.   The team was originally called Puch-Sem-Campagnolo, but de Gribaldy re-christened it Sem France-Loire in 1981, when Sem became the main sponsor.

In the squad's first year, it was captained by Joaquim Agostinho, a Portuguese cyclist who finished fifth in the Tour de France that year.  But in the summer of 1981, a certain racer who started his professional career on the Flandria team several years earlier contacted his former directeur sportif--de Gribaldy--about joining his new team.

DeGribaldy got the necessary sponsorship and signed said cyclist.  Once you know who he is, it will make--in an ironic sort of way--perfect sense that he wore the jersey in the picture.

I am talking, of course, about someone who would become of the most prominent racers of the 1980's--and one of the most successful Irish riders ever:  Sean Kelly.

With Sem, Kelly rejoined some of his former teammates, including Eddy Planckaert.  With such a strong cast, the team cast a shadow far longer than one might have expected from their small budget.  Their riders accounted for several important victories, such as the French road race championship of 1981, the Swiss Cyclo-Cross championship of the same year, as the Paris-Camembert in 1981, Paris-Nice in 1982 and Liege-Bastogne-Liege in 1983.  And, in 1983, Kelly would win the Tour de Suisse for the Sem team's last major victory.

The following year, power-tool manufacturer Skil became the main sponsor. Sem-France Loire then morphed into the Skil_sem team.  And Kelly went on to bigger and better things.  Although he never won the Tour de France outright, he took--appropriately enough--its maillot vert in 1982, 1983, 1985 and 1989.