<>Thomas Rawson forwarded (with permission) a message from Flash, one
that is quite interesting:
> Y'all,
>
> Alf was born on 24 Sept 1923, in 780 Seven Sisters Road, Tottenham.
> Alf's parents, Hyman and his wife, fled Russia in 1917.
>
> There is a rather disturbing foto of World's Champion Toni Merkens
> riding a track iron and wearing a jersey with a swastika on it; Len has
> a fotocopy of of it. Merkens was not German, but rode for German teams.
> He was later sent to the Russian front and never heard from again. There
> is no small irony in his having won World's and Olympic Championships
> riding on a London Jew's bikes.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
There is smaller irony here, too. Hyman ('Harry') Hetchin started
selling bicycles in the 1920s; later he acquired a partner and frame
builder, Jack Denny <http://hetchins.org/101.htm>. <> Mr. Denny was the
craftsman who introduced the "curly" or "vibrant" stays, and I believe
recalling that he remained involved in the business for the rest of his
working life. <>I don't know, but have assumed that he and Hetchins were
not co-religionists. Who did the Hetchins designs? Who realized actual
metal lugs and decorations from paper sketches? I don't know. I own and
love a 1973 (?) Hetchins "Spyder." As a Jew and the son of refugees, I
find the Hetchins' story neat. But, I prefer to think of the Hetchins
bikes as the product of several minds and about twice as many hands,
over several decades.
harvey sachs mcLean va (my father was from Chemnitz, Sachsen; my mother from Breslau, Silesia(?) now Wroczlaw, Poland)