I am fascinated with archival photos of women on bicycles. Perhaps because they are relatively scarce, especially shots showing women with their children on bikes. In this particular shot, Mrs. Felt (who is wearing a skirt, which in my view was more dominant than the acclaimed bloomers). Even more interesting than the lovely and stylish Adaline Felt is her daughter and her daughter’s bike basket. Attached to the handlebars, this baby bike seat has no visible restraints, and I can’t even see a method for keeping the baby in the seat. It reminds me of the time I had one of my sons in the stroller and for some reason did not fasten the middle cloth strip that keep a baby’s legs in separate stroller compartments. I think I did this (not fasten the cloth strip) because the baby was wrapped in a blanket. I’m embarrassed to say that said baby slipped right out of the stroller and onto the sidewalk once said stroller was in motion. I’m happy to say no injuries were sustained.

In Baby Felt’s case, we can only imagine that she (or he) was smart enough to hold tight, as tight as she is holding here with the bike at a standstill!

here’s a link to the photo source if you like to try to glean more: http://thoth.library.utah.edu:1701/primo_library/libweb/action/dlDisplay.do?vid=MWDL&afterPDS=true&docId=digcoll_byu_12GEA/1531

This year it’s the second annual CycloFemme ride, with nearly 160 different rides around the country and flung out to various spots in the world. A big-tent sisterhood of riders, doing all types of riding, celebrating women and bikes. Just that. In Portland, Oregon we have two rides registered – a 23-miler and a 10-miler, both ending at the season’s first car-free Sunday Parkways in East Portland. Tattoos, cupcakes, and balloons, not to mention a fun ride. But wherever you are, go out for a ride that day and register your ride at the CycloFemme site. The tent can always be bigger.

These lovely women were from the era when bikes became affordable to more cyclists.

These crazy loop the loop tracks, also called the ‘cycle dazzle’ or the ‘saucer track’ were the cause of many a cyclist’s injury or even death. A favorite racing cyclist of mine, Dottie Farnsworth, died after performing on the cycle dazzle in the tiny town of Salamanca, New York, in 1902. Farnsworth was moonlighting in the Walter Main circus, and after she built up speed, flew right off the loop and crashed. While she didn’t die directly from the injuries sustained, she succumbed to an infection some days later. Dottie, a fast and fierce racer, was 27 when she died. Some accounts claim that Dottie’s death put a stop to women’s bike racing for many years.

In any case, the loop the loop kept going and adventurous types couldn’t resist the lure. As the bicycle gave way to the motorcycle, daredevils like Margaret Gast were ready to dazzle crowds by going around and around.

‘Women Do All The Work”

Love this engraving showing a quadricycle built for four. Must have been uncomfortable for the men, who don’t even have a perch. But from a quick glance it seems the women are doing the serious pedaling and the men are just along for the ride!

Thistle was a bike brand that Tillie endorsed.

This is Women’s History Month, and in honor of that, the League of American Bicyclists and Carolyn at the League have done a great job showcasing some of the bike heroines that inspire me. They asked me to write two posts – one on Belva Lockwood, Washington DC’s first female cyclist (tricyclist), and also one on Tillie Anderson, the Swedish racing cyclist.

I searched in vain for a portrait of Belva, an enterprising feminist lawyer, with her tricycle. I thought I had found one in the Louisville paper, but couldn’t get sufficient access to the archives. I won’t give up, however. A photo of Belva with her bike-trike would be absolutely fabulous.

In the meantime, thanks to her grand-niece Alice Roepke, I did get access to fantastic shots of Tillie – you can see one of them in the slideshow above. Tillie was really amazing – she was a woman with unending endurance and speed as well as a knack for timing takeover in the many races she raced (and won).

More on these fantastic females at the League’s blog:

On Belva:

On Tillie:

Enjoy springtime cycling…even it it’s not quite spring time where you are, it’s definitely time to get mentally ready for budding trees, singing birds, lovely daffodils and some time on your bike.

Lovely Swedish cyclist does it in her street clothes. Find at: www.sockenbilden.se

I was telling the story recently of how unhappy a cyclist I once was, but I’m not sure my listeners believed me.

It’s true – my first adult experiences with cycling were miserable.

My boyfriend, a bicyclist, wanted to get me into biking. Definitely raised on the speed-sport side of bike culture, he took me on road biking rides.

My nose ran, my fingers froze, and my bicyclist boyfriend left me trailing time and again as he surged around a distant curve.

I couldn’t see (or say) one good thing about cycling.

I’m sure I’m not alone in this type of partner-pressure biking experience.

The funny thing is that now I wish I had photos of me in misery, because I think as a dedicated cyclist it is too easy to forget that there are real and perceived hurdles to getting started biking.

All it takes is one bad partner-pressure bike ride, or a horrible bike store encounter, to make a would-be rider feel like biking just ain’t worth it.

Oh, but it truly is. And there are so many ways to be a cyclist, and they are all good.

Deep down, I’m still a wimpy road-rider. I don’t like long rides, big hills, or a running nose.

And I don’t need to like them. Biking serves me. I want everyone to feel free to put on their kit and go out for a century OR wear what they’ve got and take the bike to the corner bar.

Like this woman – she manages to make her cycling stylish and casual at the same time.

It does sometimes take personal gumption to do even the things we want to. Like biking. But don’t wait. Be. Better. Bike somewhere, anywhere, in 2013.