Sorry All, whilst I was on the subject - I completely forgot, can anyone perhaps identify any of the cycle marques from these images?
Ian Briggs LUTON - UK
-----Original Message-----
Sorry if this is not an original thread and has been covered before, but today whilst carrying out some research in to the American Civil War for a book I'm writing and having got a little bored with searching "Lee" / "Gettysburg" / "Heth" / "Doubleday" etc., on a whim I typed "Cyclist" and later "Bicycle" into the search engine for their photo archive and up sprang a wealth of v.high quality / high rez pix - and amongst them some wonderful images of early (pre-WW1?) 6 Day racers.
I just love the pix of the 6-Dayers obviously taken in deep mid-winter at some unidentified US board track - dig those woolly arm & leg warmers, jumpers and hats!
Have a look.
If you want to download them in any useable format you will need a broadband link as most of the goodies are 15 - 20 megabytes in size (TIFF files).
It is interesting the note that, if you examine some of the images in detail, nearly a century on photography has not apparently moved on much in terms of final resolution...
The people at the Library of Congress have done a magnificent job here and should be applauded. As far as I know we don't have anything like this in the UK or Europe.
Click the link above and then take the links from there to the picture archive and search engine. When the selections come up make sure you take the "preview" option for the most convenient viewing.
Ian Briggs
LUTON - UK