In the late 70s I worked at Allied Cycle in Detroit, MI. The owner also imported bikes and supplied them to local dealers as well as supplying his own store. Left over from the earlier 70s were several European brands, with the most plentiful brand being Bottechia. For any of the brands that Allied stocked, they would have the lower models, and almost never the better models. These Bottechia's were always a challenge to get them to shift through all the gears, the wheels always needed more attention, and the brakes seemed to be brakes in name only. Still, these were far better than the early Taiwan bikes we sold, but that is a different tale. I know there were some better Bottechias, but we didn't have them. We did have a bunch of large size postcard Bottechia team photos and some catalogs and I sure wish I had kept some of them, but that is a common refrain, no?
rob hawks
richmond, ca