Democratic Sentinel, Volume 20, Number 27, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 10 July 1896 — Bicycles as Calamities. [ARTICLE]

Bicycles as Calamities.

Business men will presently be looking for a new St. George to demolish the latter day enemy of trade, the bicycle. One hears the same complaint on every side, “The bicycle has ruined our business.” While this state of the case is doubtless exaggerated there is still a modicum of truth in this oft-repeated wail. The bicycle fever seems to have spared no one, and as a natural consequence money that was once spent in many directions is now sunk in wheels and the concomitants thereof. It is well known that no branch of trade has been more visibly as well as radically affected by the bicycle craze than the manufacture of watches. A large number of well known firms which once found it profitable to make watches have abandoned their manufacture for that of bicycles. This Is said to be the case with well known firms in Boston, Canton, 0., and Rockford, 111. These concerns are still turning out wheels, but the wheels are no longer put in gold cases. The falling off in the demand for watches is justly attributed to the increasing number of twenty-first birthdays which are now glorified with bicycles. In the good old days his proud father always presented his hopeful son with a gold watch when the latter celebrated his accession to manhood’s estate. Now the boy must have a bicycle. In the brave dayiflpof old, when a girl was pretty enough to deserve everything she wanted she asked for jewelry or clothes or diamonds, or a poodle dog. Now she insists on a bicycle. All of which is refreshing and amusing when considered from the point of view of poesy or athletics, but to the last degree tragical when looked at through the spectacles of the honest tradesman. For the retail jeweler no longer sells papa watches or diamonds, the dry goods dealer no longer measures out silks and laces, the cigar man fails to .sell perfectos to Mary Jane’s young man, and is forced to lay in slabs of chewing gum instead. Even the tailors feel the strain. Men roll about so much in bicycle suits nowadays as never to wear out their other clothes. Theatrical managers complain bitterly that the bicycle is hurting their business. Sweethearts used to go to the theatre together when they felt the need of a let up in the ardent exercise of spooning. Now they go bicycling together. A prominent manager says that the loss to theatres on account of the mad craze for wheeling was simply incalculable. He declares that persons who never In the past were known to go out at night unless they went to thetheatre now fly about on bicycles every night and never darken a theatre’s doors. He declared that unless a change for the better occurred very soon the theatres must inevitably go to the wall. If men and women flew to the wheel with the same persistency for another year there would literally be nobody left to support the theatres. Indeed, the bicycle appears to be “hogging” everything. It confers few benefits upon the world of trade, except In the domain of confectionery and soft drinks.

Saloon-keepers are by no means satisfied with the drift of things. They say that they are selling very little hard stuff, and still less beer, to bicyclists. It appears that the wheelmen find it necessary to stick to soft drinks in order to stick to their saddles. An Immense quantity of candy is consumed by both sexes. Women are said to be Incessant chewers of gum and sweets when on the road. Men are becoming converted to the habit, and instead of smoking, as they used to do, now munch mint stick, suck lemon balls or chew gum. Wheelmen have also discovered that cycling and smoking are irreconsilable. What is the result? Retail tobacco dealers will tell you that there is a tremendous falling off in their receipts. An authority on the tobacco trade told me that the bicycle had lessened the output of the manufacturers by 70,000,000 cigars annually. Chewers also find it inexpedient to use the weed in their rides, and many have even gone to the length of giving up the habit altogether. In conclusion, attention is called to the phenomenon that some of the Chicago theatres have given up their Sunday performances because the patrons who used to flock to them now pedal their ways into green fields and over asphalt roads. The bicycle already rules the world, and its reign has been joyfully accepted. But what is the business man going to do when the woman upon whom he relies for his fortune spends all her pin money in outing suits?