First Bike

Leo on bike in 1937 or 1938. This bike was handed down to me in the late fifties.
Leo on bike in 1937 or 1938. This bike was handed down to me in the late fifties.

This is not the best picture of my father. Even he went through an awkward stage. My cousin has custody of my aunt’s (her mother’s) scrapbooks and she let my father borrow them and then he let me borrow them. This picture caught my attention. This was my first bike. My father gave me his old bike when I became old enough to ride.

We lived in the city over by School 28 on Humboldt Street and by the time my parents gave me the bike, at an age where they felt I would ride responsibly, somewhere near the awkward age of my father, I had already learned to ride by borrowing friends’ bikes. So I had to fake it when they presented the bike. I took a lot of ribbing because of this bike. Nothing that I couldn’t handle, just good natured teasing because the kickstand was something no one had seen before. The triangular stand swung down from the back spoke and held the back tire off the ground by a few inches. It was actually a pretty cool design.

At some point I got to pick out a new bike from a store on Clinton Avenue that is long gone. Seems like it had a German name. This bike was so cool. I would love to have something like it now. Medium tire width, two gears with back pedal brakes. Not a gear shift or anything. You back pedaled slightly, not enough to put the brakes on and you found the other gear.

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