The daily morning journal and courier., 1898-08-26
Drop Bars May be Prohibited.

N handlebars of all bicycles ridden in New Haven. Coroner Ell Mix has been
 asked his opinion of these rams horns" and talks senslbly as follows:
 Yes, l certainly would favor any
 such ordinance as that proposed to reg
 ulate the position of handlebars of To-
 cal wheelmen, A wheelman bending over his bars Is certainly not as alert, objects In front and behind escaping his attention, as his gaze is fastened on
 the ground before the front wheel. This position makes the bicyclist an ob- ject of danger both to the pedestrian
 and wheelhan himself.
 Tn Washington, D. C., believe there
 is some such ordinance as it is proposed to enact here. Many, if not the major ity of the accidents to cyclists which
 have come to my attention are directly traceable to the stopping position of the rider who has not seen either the car, | carriage, pedestrian or wheelman, as the case may be, ahead or behind him. T have talked this matter over with | member of the city government and with the president of one of the local electric roads, and both declared in fa- | vor of such a measure.
 Just as much speed as the law al- | lows can be gotten out of a wheel, rid 1 ing in an upright position as when | stopping way over. cannot see why anyone should object to this law as 1t would simply be in force in New Haven. | If they wished to scorch they could go outside the city limits and speed over | country roads in whatever position | pleased them.
 Tn my opinion the cyclist in the above position is more dangerous than
 runaway horse, as the latter may be | heard and avoided, but the former with | his truly silent steed, comes upon you ! unheard and cannot be avoided"
 1 Bicycles in China.
 According to advices by the national | board of trade from the United States | consul at Shanghai, the use of the bicy- | the last year. The consul has written
 special letter to the board, in which | he explains the causes for the boom and | also describes customs that are dis tinctly interesting. Society there is dominated by the English idea that ex- ] ercise is necessary for the maintenance l of health in that climate, and all class
 es have begun within the twelvemonth | to employ the bicycle as the medium | for their exercise. There are no nar-
 row paths for pedestrians and horses,
 and as a rule they are not wide enough
 for vehicles. They are dusty In dry
 weather, very muddy after rain and at all times so rough as not to be practical 1 ble for cycling. These roads are not
 maintained by the community, but each landowner takes care of the section 1 immediately in front of his property.
 There is general lack of public spirit,
 and no one does anything on the road
 that he can avoid. As result the
 paths grow narrower and rougher, in-
 stead of improving. In consequence of
 this bicycling has hard time of 1t. It
 is only on the roads which have been
 built by the foreigners in the immediate
 vicinity of the larger towns and cities
 that cycling is possible The boom in
 the sport has been for the most part
 among the foreign population. Few
 Chinese have taken to the wheel.
 | English Models for '99.
 Some makers on the other side are re- l ported as entertaining the belief that l the frames commonly used in the con- 1 struction of mems machines are too
 rigid, and as a result every inequality 1 in the road surface produces vibration,
 which affects the weakest part of the frame, which weak point is variable
 The opinion is expressed that mans machine built upon the plan of those at
 present constructed for women will be | found an improvement, inasmuch as | the open frame has certain amount of | ,tol,, ,;e,+n sequently, no one part is subject to ex-
 tra strain, the ordinary strain being | evenly distributed, owing to the slight
 yield of the frame, and the likelihood of breaking at any one part being reduced l to a minimum. One English company I is experimenting with a frame in which the top tube bows downward and the
 rear stays bow forward, while the low CT rail curves down behind the front l wheel for some distance and then I sweeps back to the bottom bracket | The diagonal tube and lower rear forks are not interfered with so that the
 saddle, crank axle and driving wheel
 axle are connected in the same way as | in the rigid machine. If this is all true 1 it means another reversion to an early | type. For years the tendency has been | steadily toward increasing the rigidity l of frames, and the makers who are att
 tempting this return to spring frames will find an enormous amount of preju- | dice to overcome.
 The National Meet
 President Potter, in speaking of the
 national meet at Indianapolis, says:
 ''The attendance was all that could l have been expected. Those with whom
 I talked expressed themselves as satis-
 fled. We had a fine time, and the Indi-
 ana division added largely to it's mem- | bership. We had meeting of the local l organization committee, and a number | of plans were formulated for prosecut- l ing the work. If we had perfect local | organizations, national meets and all | others would be rousing affairs. Sup
 pose the members of the league at New l York Indianapolis, Buffalo, Boston and all of the large cities were in close 1 touch with each other, as the members | of a club are. They would make up l large delegations to go to the meets
 and being in a body much better time would be spent than if they struggled
 along singly. Now the New York men | have to make up their minds, each one | for himself, whether to go or not If | they co-operated it would be very diff | ferent The members from Indianapo- I lis would say: Well, those Boston !