Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1909-02-07
old BOYS MEET AGAIN
Capital Bicycle Club Veterans
Assemble for Dinner.
RECALL WHEELING DAYS
These Present Were Members Over
Twenty Years Ago.
RIDE THE OLD RUNS" AGAIN
Repeat the Oft-Told Yarns and Re-
view the History Of the
Organization.

view the History Of the
Organization.
Around a table which bore striking
resemblance to a bicycle wheel there sat
last night at RauScher'S about sixty
five .'old boys''-old time wheelmen-who
twenty years ago and more belonged to
that hot tamale" organization, the Capt.
tai Bicycle Club. The club is still in
existence but it is not the club of yore,
so say the old boys. and last nights din
ner was not really a club affair. because
to he allowed to sit at the end Of one
OF the spokes in the wheel one must have
been member at least twenty years ago.
regardless of whether he is member
now or not.
These old boys rode high wheels in the
very palmest days of the newborn
speed king. They rode wheels on which
some of the youthful sports of this day
would hardly know where to sit. They
rode wheels that had odd clicking pedals:
high things with Z little wheel III front
and big wheel behind and vice versa.
And the runs they made. And the
records they broke. Is it all true or did
the Ananias Club. originate with bicycling
III the early eighties.
Ride Back to Former Days.
Well. last night they all got up on their
wheels and rode back again to those de-
lightful days when the klub Kat and G.
Bi c. furnished lots of fun for all hands.
OF course the oft-told yarn of how the
club really came into existence was told
again for perhaps its three thousandth
time, but as Clarence Allen. one of the
old boys, said, "A good tale is worth tell
ing more than twice In 10 Herbert y
Owen. Max Hansmann, Fred ID. owen,
l.. Phil Einold. Frank G.. Wood, >. W.
Jessunoffsky and Charles krauskof met
and formed the club Just a week too late
to be the first of its kind in America
They selected officers and uniform-and
great tales they do tell of that uniform
They say that one of the members of the
club was next summer thrown out of d
hotel for wearing one.
Climbing Standpipe Hill.
Very nearly everybody last night had
something to say. and the list of speeches
would reach from Washington clear out
as far as some of those rides the old boys
used to take They told how awful it was
to climb "Standpipe hill the head of
18th street, and how Max Hansmann.
Warren Seeley and MacBorden were
each ridden it several times. Also how
Doc Schooley had ridden forty-six
miles in six hours There were tales in
Vulnerable and toasts for everything and
everybody.
The history of the club came in for 4
very fair share of the talk last evening.
dwelling of the Stove.
The very first clubhouse was at s13
10th street In 1880 and 1881 it was at
Alp 18th street, the site now occupied by
The Stars pressroom. 1t was at this
18th street home that some of the things
occurred which stick in the memories of
the old timers faster than anything else.
For instance, they had the ''unveiling Of
the stove" and the eccentric ceremonies
at that time We're helped out by large
~ augmented orchestra" In those same
rooms Bert Owen electrified the city by
d fast mile round and round between
walls less than twenty feet apart.
In the LeDroit building rooms the
Klub Kat presentation was made. 1t was
presented by President Hawley Gin the
name of the sphynx of the Japanese En-
peror Ho-Chung of Oscar the Beautiful
and DR.. Mary the Brave"
Notable Speech by Hawley.
And this speech of Hawley's fingers in
the memories of all the old boys:
Where the ordinary cat stops this
one begins. He serenaded the daughter
of Pharoah and made night a terror to
the steerage passengers of the ark. He
roa med through the ages of the past
grand. gloomy and peculiar; he has
altghted upon the pedestal Of this club
to be to us an emblem, d protector, a
patron, u shield, coat Of arms, all in
one"
And who will say that humor and pleas
antry started in this decade. when the
story of the Procession of the Sacred Cat
is told. Modelled strictly after the lines
of the famous picture in the Corcoran
Gallery of the Procession of the Sacred
Bull, the men of the club took the part
of coryphees. priests and priesteSses, Isis
and Osiris, Flora and Pomona and scat
tered apples and peanuts along their
line of march.
Zenith of Prosperity.
The zenith OF prosperity for the club
was reached when the building at 409
18th street was taken by the members
For twenty-five years the club has lived
there. 1t is in one of the five squares
which the government will acquire, so
what the club will do In the future Is
problem.
1t was recalled last night that the only
sight that ever ratified the Goddess of
Liberty was when she saw Bert Owen
riding down the Capitol steps on an old
time high bicycle. Bert also was the hero
OF a thirty-Inile ride Through Maryland
with one leg of his trousers torn off. Bert
Owen was not present last night He is
visiting in Nevada.
Alex Smith. an oldtme fancy rider.
was there. however. and was greeted
heartily. Stories from the famous ban
guet OF 1SS9. when the club was just ten
years old, We're told again. Clarence AL
len told tale after tale and recited an
original poem. From Marlboro which
dealt with a chap who started out TO ride
from Marlboro and caught in a
snow storm. 1t was so true TO the old
time memories that he received encore
after encore.
'Bumblepuppy" Twenty Years Ago.
1t was recalled that at that twenty
years-ago banquet one of the toasts was
Whist and Bumblepuppy and that the
latter term autedated the furore through
out the country when Judge Taft made
use of it a while ago by score of years.
Some of the old club songs were SING last