Beautiful Quote

[boogieman]

I just want to share this beautiful quote to all rat rod enthusiasts out there, so here it is:

"When you undertake to investigate a bicycle for the first time, take an old one as a subject, and endeavor it to put it in perfect running order."

Maria E. Ward, THE COMMON SENSE OF BICYCLING,1896


Ride safe, Ride Happy.

 

[MplsCoaster]

Hey Boogieman,
Great Quote!
It's interesting that is so relevant to bike building and this website 105 years later
Just got done reading "The Lost Cyclist"
It's about the bike boom/craze during the late 1800s
Lots of insight to that era, lots of analogies and relevance to now
If you want to "enjoy" the story read only until pg 169 before the Lenz disappearance investigation

Thanks for posting the quote

 

[boogieman]

you're most welcome MplsCoaster.

 

[Wildcat]

I wonder how many old bikes there were back in 1896.

 

[MplsCoaster]

You're right Wildcat, I guess "old" is a relative term :lol:

 

[Rustinkerer]

I suppose 1890's rat rodders were rolling on wooden bone shakers! "These new fangled chains and rubber tires are too modern!" :lol: -Adam

 

[ZygoteLittle]

"Get a bicycle. You will not regret it; if you live."
- "Taming the Bicycle"

"It was on the 10th day of May--1884--that I confessed to age by mounting spectacles for the first time, and in the same hour I renewed my youth, to outward appearance, by mounting a bicycle for the first time. The spectacles stayed on." – Mark Twain

"I feel that I am entitled to my share of lightheartedness and there is nothing wrong with enjoying one's self simply, like a boy." – Leo Tolstoy In response to criticism for learning to ride a bicycle at age 67

"When man invented the bicycle he reached the peak of his attainments. Here was a machine of precision and balance for the convenience of man. And (unlike subsequent inventions for man's convenience) the more he used it, the fitter his body became. Here, for once, was a product of man's brain that was entirely beneficial to those who used it, and of no harm or irritation to others. Progress should have stopped when man invented the bicycle." – Elizabeth West

 

[Anonymous]

"Never underestamate the power of stupid people in large places"

HEH!

(Not my quote.)

 

[ZygoteLittle]

“It is by riding a bicycle that you learn the contours of a country best, since you have to sweat up the hills and coast down them. Thus you remember them as they actually are, while in a motor car only a high hill impresses you, and you have no such accurate remembrance of country you have driven through as you gain by riding a bicycle.” – Ernest Hemingway

“The journey of life is like a man riding a bicycle. We know he got on the bicycle and started to move. We know that at some point he will stop and get off. We know that if he stops moving and does not get off he will fall off.” – William G. Golding (English Novelist and Poet. Nobel Prize in Literature, 1983.)

“Cycle tracks will abound in Utopia.” – H.G. Wells

“Whenever I see an adult on a bicycle, I have hope for the human race.” – H.G. Wells

 

[ZygoteLittle]

”I'm lazy. But it's the lazy people who invented the wheel and the bicycle because they didn't like walking or carrying things. – Lech Walesa


”If I can bicycle, I bicycle.” – David Attenborough


”A woman without a man is like a fish without a bicycle.” – Gloria Steinem

 

[Anonymous]

"Do The Best You Can With What You Have"

My Grandpop Miller.

 

[ZygoteLittle]

”It would not be at all strange if history came to the conclusion that the perfection of the bicycle was the greatest incident of the nineteenth century.” – Author Unknown

”Tens of thousands who could never afford to own, feed and stable a horse, had by this bright invention enjoyed the swiftness of motion which is perhaps the most fascinating feature of material life.” – Frances Willard, How I Learned to Ride the Bicycle

”The bicycle is the most civilized conveyance known to man. Other forms of transport grow daily more nightmarish. Only the bicycle remains pure in heart.” – Iris Murdoch, The Red and the Green

”The bicycle will accomplish more for women's sensible dress than all the reform movements that have ever been waged.” – Author Unknown, from Demerarest's Family Magazine, 1895

”The bicycle is just as good company as most husbands and, when it gets old and shabby, a woman can dispose of it and get a new one without shocking the entire community.” – Ann Strong

 

[MplsCoaster]

Awesome quotes guys!

 

[Anonymous]

Murphy's Laws...

http://www.murphys-laws.com/murphy/murphy-laws.html