Great message Reed, welcome & thanks!
I agree that it is wonderful to see this "second generation" of young people coming to appreciate the bicycles we love. True, their stylistic approach m ay vary a bit from others (us!) but the bottom line is that they are enjoyin g and supporting this traditional machine form.
Dale Brown Greensboro, North Carolina 27408 USA
-----Original Message----- From: Reed Pike <reedpike@mac.com> To: classicrendezvous@bikelist.org Sent: Sat, 24 Nov 2007 1:58 pm Subject: [CR]Fixies, restorations, upgrades, etc
Hello all, Â
New member here â and I apologize in advance for the length and ramb ling nature of this e-mail. Â
As a matter of introduction, my name is Reed Pike. I am old enough to remember purchasing, riding and even wrenching on many of the bicycles discussed on this list. I bought my first ârealâ bicycle, a red LeJUENE with some Campy components, at Peter Richâs store someti me in the late 1960's or very early 1970âs. It was a great bike, but what I really wanted was the baby blue pantographed DeRosa on display at Talbotâ s. I was young and impatient â the LeJUENE was cheaper! I work ed for a short time sweeping floors on Saturdays at Spence Wolfâs store and through that have spent most of the last 35 years or so working in the bicycle industry â I am currently the Marketing Director at Ral eigh America. Â
Oh that I had the foresight to keep the Masi Gran Criteriums (3 at least), R aleigh Pro, Gitanes, Motobecane, Moulton, Peugeot, Paramounts (2 at least), Merckx, Colnago, Windsor, CIOCC, Concorde, Olmos, and many oth er bicycles I have owned, not to mention all the parts and ephemera that has passed though my hands. Â
I would like to say hello to Richard (Cunningham and Bryne), Brian Baylis, J oe Bell and all the other friends and acquaintances from San Diego who have at one time or another appeared on this list. Â
I have only recently come to look back with more than a casual interest on t he bicycles of my youth. Raleigh has quite a history and that was in part the motivation, that and the growing interest in simple ste el bicycles that has developed as a trend based on the messenger/urban bike culture â fixies. And that is reason for my writing today. Â
I am not sure that the recent e-mails (including this one, sorry Dale) on subjects like fixies, headbadge collectors, and whether to upgrade etc. are truly âon topicâ, but all of these issues have had and willcontinue to have an influence/impact on the classic bicycle market â positive and negative. Â
For me personally these discussions and lamentations on the various impacts of upgrading, restoration, headbadge collecting, customizing (fixies, repain ts, commuter conversions, etc), blah, blah, blah are as Yogi Berra said, âitâs like deja-vu all over again.â For a periodin the late 80âs and through most of the 90â s I was a passionate collector and rider of classic British motorcycles. Joe Bell even painted a gas tank and side covers from a Triumph Daytona for me. Back to the point â these same discussions and lamentations were (and pro bably still are) great points of debate in the classic motorcycle community. Â Â
I am not going to attempt to draw too many parallels or especially any conclusions today. Nor will I attempt to make a case for any particular pers pective. I believe that there is value to all forms of appreciation of classic bicycles â the collection of rare, historica lly important bicycles â collecting in general â the preserv ation of bicycles in original condition â the restoration of bicycles that have been ârode hard and put away wetâ or negl ected âthe restoration of bicycles that have a particular meaning or value to their present owner â riding classic bicycles in their original cond ition as they were meant to be ridden, racing, touring, etc â riding classic bicycles that have been upgraded as they were meant to be ridden â customizing classic bicycles, to mention just a few. Eac h of these in their own way are performing an important function â inc reasing the number of people who recognized that classic bicycles have value and that the value can be appreciated in many ways. Â
Yes, all of this will probably result in higher prices for classic bicycles, parts, etc. Some bicycles and parts may even become even more difficult to find. But if the classic motorcycle scene is any indication there may be off sets â along with a growth in the number ofpeople (people with money to spend) interested in classic bicycles and an increase in their value, more bicycles may be taken out of storage or found, fewer bicycles will be thrown in the rubbish and/or âimpro vedâ, there will be further development of resources like thisone, m ore events like the Classic Rendezvous, maybe even a for profit magazine or two, re-manufacture of key parts (think tires, chains, etc), an expansion of the restoration industry, etc. Â
And just as there are in the classic motorcycle community, there will be some classic bicycle collectors and enthusiasts who will not see an upside to any of these developments. For many of them it was (and still is t o some extent) a nice private club of passionate true believers and now ther e are all these interlopers who are mucking up the market. Change is inevita ble; the choice is to adapt and stay part of the evolving community or to become a bitter curmudgeon who over time is more and more irrelevant to the community. Â
It has been exciting to watch this expanding interest in classic bicycles de velop over the last few years. A previous writer pointed out that these new younger classic bicycle enthusiasts are the âsecondgenerationâ . They represent the future â I hope the classic bicycle community will welcome them. They have so much to learn and you are the repo sitory of that knowledge. I know I have learned more over the past month or so than I could have imagined when I joined this community â thank you. Â
Best regards, Â
Reed PikeÂ
Seattle, WAÂ Â
_______________________________________________Â
Classicrendezvous mailing listÂ
Classicrendezvous@bikelist.orgÂ
http://www.bikelist.org/
________________________________________________________________________ Email and AIM finally together. You've gotta check out free AOL Mail! - http ://mail.aol.com
_______________________________________________
Classicrendezvous mailing list
Classicrendezvous@bikelist.org
http://www.bikelist.org/