Sheldon brings up a good point.
The term "Lightweight" as I know it going back into the early '40's was used
for the English 3-sp and bikes of that nature,
Our balloon bikes with separate tires and tubes came in '33 with the Arnold,
Schwinn's first production of that size in America
Schwinn used the motorcycles and cars as examples to copy and relate to the
public. It was good promotion.
The older bikes at the turn of the century had all different tire sizes in
the single tube diameters, but the !-1/2 size on the Mead was the Standard
American size as Sheldon relates.
Our middleweight sizing came in the '50s with the introduction of the 1.75
US standard, and then the 1-3/4 S-7 Schwinn size to keep their rim different
and not interchangeable for original equipment sales.
Germany was using the 1.75 size for years, English and it's world empire
mostly 28-1/2 and the rest of Europe all the various combos of 1-1/2 + or-
in their metric, inch or whatever.
After the war, the common terms were: Balloon for standard American;
Middlewight for the 1.75 / 1-3/4 sizes ; and Lightweight for anything
thinner like 1-3/8 - 1-1/4, which many people called "racer" bikes for lack
of information.
90% of Americans had no idea what a racing bike really was.
To put it in perspective, when I started racing in '47/48 there were about
1000 people that had racing licenses including all the officials and
relatives to beef up the roster.
It grew after that, but the warand depression had taken it's toll and as our
indutries started civilian productions again, bicycles were regarded as part
of the toy industry, cars were the kings of the road.
Ted Ernst
Palos Verdes Estates
CA USA
> Actually the Mead Ranger, or at least my 1916 one which looks a LOT like
> yours is not a "middleweight" but rather a "lightweight."
>
> The definition of "middleweight" that I've always understood is something
> with 1.75 tires.
>
> I really like my Mead Ranger a lot. It rides as nicely as any bike I've
> ever owned. It's amazing how mature bicycle design was even back then.
>
> See: http://sheldonbrown.org/
>
> Sheldon "Oldie" Brown
>
> --
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> Phone 617-244-9772 FAX 617-244-1041
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