Would you call this irony? I took this photo at 5701 Broadway in the Bronx, an AutoZone, there is probably very little in this store that could help George in the modern-day, and not many trees or bushes are seen in this vicinity anymore either.
“As I could not make the motor work, I concluded on the morning of July 5 to make myself work. I started to pedal in to New York. That last 150 miles down the Hudson from Albany is a part of my trip of which I will always have a vivid recollection.
I had seen some hills before, but the motor climbed them for me. In the hills along the Hudson, I had to climb and push the motor along. They seemed steeper than the Rocky Mountains. This I will say, though – from the time I left the Pacific coast I saw no grander scenery than that along the Hudson River.
While other sights were not up to expectation, the scenery of the Hudson was far beyond it. So enthusiastic was I that I pedaled along all night on July 5. It was a long, dreary and strenuous ride, but I was well seasoned by this time and fit to do a mule’s work.”
July 6, 1903 (New York City)
“After riding two days and a night under leg power or rather over it, I reached
“Josh” interview Broadway & W. 195th Street
The exact spot at Broadway & W. 195th Street today…in the rain!
New York in the middle of the afternoon on July 6. I made frequent stops to rest and I attracted more than a little attention but I was too tired to care. I can smile now as I recall the sight I was with my overalls on, my face and hands black as a mulatto’s, my coat torn and dirty, a big piece of wood tied on with rope where my handlebars should be, and the belt hanging loose from the crankshaft.
I was told that I was “picturesque” by a country reporter named “Josh,” who captured me for an interview a little way up the Hudson, and who kept me talking while the photographer worked his camera, but to my ideal, I was too dirty to be picturesque. At any rate, I was too tired then to care. All I wanted was a hot bath and a bed.
The Josh Interview
But before I got these I had to telephone to The Motorcycle Magazine to learn where to go and wait to have more cameras pointed at me before being escorted to my hostelry.
Of all the sleep I had during my trip, none was more profound, or sweeter than the one I had that night of July 6 at the Herald Square Hotel, just 50 days after I left San Francisco for my ride across the continent on my motor bicycle.”
A photo from the 1920’s of the Herald Square Hotel
Along with most things of that era, the Herald Square Hotel has gone, and is now a shoe store, and yes I’m parked by a fire hydrant, but it was worth it to get the shot for the inmates at the end of the ride…A cop moved me on within seconds.
Epilogue – Across America on a Motor Bicycle
New York Motor Cycle Club “While I slept at the Herald Square Hotel, my ride really ended at the New York Motor Cycle Club’s rooms, No. 1904 Broadway. It was there I left the faithful little machine that had carried me some 3,800 miles. What was the exact distance I never will be able to tell, because, as previously related, after breaking four cyclometers, I ceased to bother with the mileage.
Compared with the first cycling journey across the continent, that of Thomas Stevens in 1882, the first effort of the motor bicycle does not suffer. Mr. Stevens required 103 1/2 days to ride from San Francisco to Boston; my journey was completed in 50 days.
While the idea of establishing a record was no part of my purpose, it is worthy of remark that none of the three powerful automobiles that have since crossed the continent have come near to equaling my time.
With the experience gained and with a more powerful machine – the one I used was of but 1¼ horsepower – I feel confident that the journey from ocean to ocean can be made in 30 days without particularly strenuous effort. With a railway attachment, such as is in common use by bicyclists in the West, and which would permit the use of rails across the deserts of Nevada, it will be possible to more than realize the 30 days’ estimate.
Wyman “Pose”
While it is true that my forks broke and the motor crank axle also gave way, these are unusual accidents; nearly all of my other troubles were minor ones, the belt being a most prolific source.
But, as a whole, the motor behaved splendidly and performed its work well under many trying conditions. Its failure at Albany was really the only occasion when it gave me serious concern. Subsequent examination proved that the inlet valve had in some way become jammed so as to be immovable, at least with the means at my command.
Between fear of breaking something and anxiety to reach New York, I possibly did not take the chances at making a strenuous repair that under other circumstances I would have taken.
Save the forks, the bicycle also stood up well. The wonder is that it stood up at all, so terrific and so frequent was the pounding it received in the many miles of cross-tie travel. The saddle, too, deserves praise. Despite its many drenchings and mud and the heat of the desert and the banging of the railroad ties, it did not stretch or sag the fractional part of an inch, and reached New York in as good condition as when it left San Francisco.”
Plotting George Wymans route as closely as I could using period correct maps, but rarely being able to plot exactly due to Gaia not allowing a route to go along the railroad, I put his mileage as 3838 miles
The final route below, based on the waypoints he went through and sticking as closely to the railroad as possible.
San Francisco California to New York, New York
*************
In conclusion, my thoughts.
Firstly I’d like to thank the https://wymanmemorialproject.blogspot.com/ and the group that put this whole thing together, their research was incredible and there is no way I or any other rider could replicate the journey without this research.
From their website –
Project Organization – The George A. Wyman Memorial Project, Inc., is organized under IRS provisions 501(c)(3) nonprofit, historical preservation, educational and community outreach organization (47-3332474).
Volunteer Officers and Staff Tim Masterson, MBA, Project Manager (President) Cliff Wall, CPA, Chief Financial Officer (Treasurer) Howard Entman, MD, Secretary Duncan Ragsdale, Esq. Counsel Marti Wyman Schein, Research Director
The George A. Wyman Memorial Project claims copyrights to the following: “The George A. Wyman Memorial Grand Tour”, “Points Along the Way” and “The George A. Wyman Memorial Rally” when used to describe or applied to the chronologically organized and formatted listing of locations associated with the 1903 San Francisco to New York City transcontinental journey of George A. Wyman. Fair Use Disclaimer: The George A. Wyman Memorial Project, organized as a 501(c)(3) historical research, preservation and educational non-profit, makes no copyright claim to the public domain materials contained in this document, any photographs, charts or illustrations, most all of which were published prior to 1923, and therefore reside in the public domain, as described by Title 17, US Code. The George A. Wyman Memorial Project respects the intellectual property of others and where appropriated accords attribution to materials used in this document.
By A. NICHOLS JERVIS (The following article appeared in The Motorcycle Magazine in November, 1903)
It is doubtful if even those motorcyclists who have followed the story of George A. Wyman’s trip across the continent, form San Francisco to New York, which was concluded in the Motorcycle Magazine last month, appreciate fully how exceptionally excellent a performance it was. Now that the narrative has been completed and a review of the whole trip can be taken, it stands out in its entirety as a supreme triumph for the motor bicycle. It was not only the most notable long distance record by a motorcycle, but also it was the greatest long trip made in this country by any sort of a motor vehicle. This is a fact to which attention was not called by Wyman in his story and it is one that should be emphasized. In fact, Wyman’s story was altogether too modest throughout.
No motor vehicle, other than Wyman’s motor bicycle, has made the trip across the American continent within 50 days. Several automobiles, large and small, carrying a couple of men, have made the trip across the continent since Wyman showed the way, but none has done it in so short a time as he did, so that he has the credit not only of being the first to bring a motor vehicle across the continent, but also for holding the best record time for the performance.
In calculating Wyman’s time as 50 days the time was taken from the day he left San Francisco until that on which he reached New York, and in this injustice was done, because Wyman left San Francisco late in the afternoon on May 16, and simply crossed the bay to Vallejo, where he stayed the night. He arrived in New York City early in the afternoon on July 6, and so his total time, counting the morning of May 17, when he left Vallejo, was only 49 days, and even then no allowance is made for nearly half a d on July 6 that he was in New York City. This is, of course, the total elapsed time. The time lost by Wyman when he was not riding sums up to 11 days, making his net riding time 38 days, and there were circumstances particularly extenuating about his loss of time. The records of the automobilists(sic) who have since made the trip from ocean to ocean are not only poorer than those of Wyman, but are much poorer. Dr. H.N. Jackson, who was the first to make the trip in an automobile, was 63 days in doing it. He left San Francisco on May 23 and arrive in New York July 25. He had a car of 20 horsepower. E.T. Fetch, with a 12-horsepower automobile took 61 day for the trip, leaving San Francisco June 20 and reaching New York August 21. L.L. Whitman, the third and, up to date, the last to perform the journey, required 73 days with a runabout of five-horsepower.
Wyman had a bicycle weighing only 90 pounds with a motor on it of 1-1/4 rated horsepower. When he lost time by laying-to during a storm it was more excusable than in the case of men with a motor many times more powerful on a car built high enough to chary the rider through ordinarily small floods dryshod(sic), and strong enough to resist the wrenching caused by the corduroy roads of the West. Another feature of Wyman’s feat that adds greatly to the credit of it is that he was alone. Through all the dreary deserts and mountain fastnesses, he had no companion to cheer and encourage him; no one to join in the laugh and jest that reduces the apparent magnitude of the obstacles; no one to help him pull his machine out of the mud, or lift it over boulders. Moreover, he had no shelter from the sun and rain and wind, as had all the others, in the form of big umbrellas, and he could not wear a long rubber coat as could those who rode in the automobiles. He had no one to help him make a repair or an adjustment. When his ears were frozen, as the were one morning in May, he could not turn over the operation of his bicycle to a companion and give attention to himself. He had to dismount, and as his vehicle was one that would not stand alone, and there was not a post of building near against which to lean it, he had to carefully shut off his motor, find a suitable place, and carefully lay it down. He was alone, utterly, drearily alone, with the solitude of the deserts and the mountains and all the strenuousness of his undertaking constantly confronting him.
While the automobiles had some advantage in being better able to withstand the racking strain of rough roads because of greater weight, and better able to push through sandy and muddy stretches because of higher horsepower, the advantages of the motorcycle over the four-wheelers were many and manifest. Being a single-tracking vehicle, it had a wider range of variation in picking the best part of the roads, or trails, and could often find fair going at the edge of a muddy highway, where the four-wheelers had no choice, but to force the wheels, on one side at least, through the heavy going. Again, it was possible for Wyman to lift his vehicle bodily from the ground and also to take to the railroad and ride between the ties or over then, which he did for about half the distance travelled. His greatest delay was that of five days, when he waited at Chicago for a motor crankshaft to be received from San Francisco. This should not have happened, for there was an agency for the motor bicycle Wyman was using in Chicago, and he reasonably expected to be able to get any part he wanted there.
The contrast between the trip of the motor bicycle and those made by the automobiles stands out sharply when it is remembered what expedients were frequently resorted to by the operators of the four-wheeled cars. One carried a block and tackle and resorted to its use repeatedly. The drivers put on big canvas flaps over the tires, or laid canvas strips for the wheels by hand over the desert sand in order to make headway in the desert. Time and time again they were obliged to call upon men with horses to help them out of the mud or sand holes. One of them was followed halfway across the continent by a factory expert, who used the railroad trains to go from town to town and thus remain within call when help or repairs were required. Wyman had help only once during his whole trip, that time being when he was mired near Laramie. The adaptability to circumstances of the man with a motor bicycle was shown when Wyman, driven from the tracks of one railroad a hundred feet to one side and “toted” his bicycle. At another time, when driven from the tracks, he walked through a big grain field a mile or two to the highway. Such things were impossible for the four-wheelers.
On the whole, Wyman’s ride and the record he made is one that seems to demonstrate the superiority of the motor bicycle over any other style of vehicle for courier services. Wyman’s bicycle gave out utterly as a motor vehicle at Albany, and he finished by pedalling into New York, travelling over the steep hills of the Hudson River shore. This would not have been possible for any of those who made the trip in automobiles. Had their vehicles given out, as Wyman’s did, their trip would have been ended there.
It is when the availability of the motor bicycle and the automobile for military service are considered and compared that Wyman’s performance stands out in the most superior way. Even when his motor was giving trouble and he was travelling at his slowest rate, he was doing better than a horse could have done, and his average daily headway was much better than that of any of the big cars. Great value attaches to the trip because of the data and suggestions it affords to military authorities. There in no reason why Wyman should not have had an extra motor crankshaft with him. He could have carried a complete supply of new parts much easier than an automobile than an automobile could. Allowing that under military conditions it would have been possible to have obtained parts along the road, as all the automobiles did , he still would have had an advantage, because it takes less time to make a repair on a bicycle than on a four-wheeled motor vehicle. It would seem that in time of war when railroads are not available that two men, each on a light motor bicycle, would be the best possible dispatch bearers. If there were to on the errand time would be saved because of the assistance one could give to the other in making repairs, and because they would make pace turn and turn about. In case of serious mishap to either man there would be the other to on on, and if one bicycle was seriously damaged the other could continue, while if both cycles were much damaged the probability is that by rearing one apart the patch the other it could be made fit to complete the journey.
It is not often these days, even during war, that such a long and strenuous journey would be required of any man and vehicle. Wyman’s record stands, however, as a demonstration of what is possible under extremely unusual circumstances. The demonstration teaches also that much better time will be possible with the experiences of the first attempt to guide. In whatever way the Wyman trip is viewed, it must be conceded to be a triumphant demonstration of the practicability and many sidedness(sic) of the motor bicycle as well as an everlasting credit to the plucky young man who performed the feat.
I do find it sad that this amazing historical ride almost disappeared and in fact went missing for around 30 years. With three cars doing the same crossing they got the glory, not George Wyman, and later in the year, the Wright Brothers flight changed how people looked at travel.
The website above has an amazing amount of information and links (hours and hours of reading if you click every link) if you want to replicate this ride.
I imported the waypoints into my Garmin ZumoXT, I then tried to stay as close to George’s route as possible and also not use any freeways, I found the ‘Adventurous Routing’ option worked best and set the unit to ignore freeways when possible, I think I rode maybe 100-200 miles of freeway otherwise the alternative was huge distances.
Out of 160 waypoints, I think I went to 156 of them. My total mileage on the George Wyman route was 3851 miles, and 8 days riding from sun up to sun down every day with no days off, my door-to-door was a little over 7400 miles, and my list of repairs needed was just one chain.
It was the biggest, longest scavenger hunt I have ever been on, and got to see parts of America I would never have normally directed myself to ride in.
Hope you guys enjoyed it as much as I did riding it…until the next one, go get you some adventure!
“I left Cayuga at 8 a.m. and took my troubles with me, The batteries were growing weak; first the cyclets(sic) of the belt broke and then the lacing; next the crank axle got out of true, and every time it struck, the belt broke. I had these troubles all day.
Toward night the belt broke five times in one mile. I got some new batteries at Syracuse, but after going two miles on them they would not yield a spark, so I went back and returned them, and after a search I managed to get some good batteries.
Syracuse used to have a flourishing canal network and was very industrial because of it, George doesn’t say where he got his batteries but maybe in this area, now where the canal is no longer
The fates seemed in a conspiracy to prevent my getting to New York before July 4. The motor was getting in such shape that I realized I would be lucky if I could finish with it at all.
To add to my troubles these two days from Rochester, July 1 and 2, were terribly hot and I was nearly prostrated by the heat. I managed to make 65 miles and get to Canastota by 9:30 p.m. on the second, and as that was the day I had hoped to be in the metropolis, I did not go to bed in any cheerful humor.”
July 3, 1903 (Canastota to Albany, NY)
“At 7 a.m. on July 3, I started from Canastota; determined to get to Albany, at least, that day. I had trouble from the start. I relaced the belt seven times during the forenoon, and then I spliced it with a new piece at Little Falls.
I was still 40 miles from Albany when my handlebars broke off on one side. I had been there a couple of times before during the trip, and it did not take me long to lash a stick across the steering stem. Soon after, the piston began to squeak, and I discovered that the rings on it were worn out. Oil was of no avail, and I rode on with the squeak for company.
G.Wyman
Six miles from Albany, while I was on the towpath, the rear tire blew out. There was a hole in it that would admit a hand. I walked into Albany. Some of the remarks I made to myself as I walked were not fit for quoting to a Sunday school class. My distance that day was 135 miles. This was to be my last day of big mileage though.
On his way to Albany he would have gone via Little Falls, I had to do a little searching but found the plaque at the back of the Historical Society
All the way through New York state I used the cycle path without a license. It was not until after my trip ended that I knew I had been violating the law.”
July 4, 1903 (Delayed in Albany, NY)
“On the Fourth of July my first move in the morning was to a bicycle store, where I got a new tire and put in 14 new spokes, and then took the motor apart.
The piston rings were worn pretty thin but looked as if they would still give service, so at 2:30 p.m. I started from Albany. Four miles out, I gave it up. The motor would not explode as it should. I went back to the bicycle store in Albany and worked on the problem there until night. Then I went to see the fireworks and forget about it.”
in a dispatch he sent to the“Bicycling World” he mentioned the J.W. Anderson Agency. Research of the Albany business directory showed a F.W. Anderson, 467 Madison Ave as the only “Anderson” listed under either bicycle or automobile repair.
If a motorcycle shop has to close what business would you be happy to see in its place…a Ben and Jerry’s Icecream shop, of course
I looked at the route ahead and it wasn’t looking good at all…
I looked at the weather radar and it seemed if I headed to a particular area they were expected to be dry for the next 24 hours, and not have floods like the rest of the area…’they’ were wrong
“I spent two hours in a repair shop in Angola the next morning, June 29, and at the end of that time the repairer pronounced the forks mended sufficiently to carry me through to New York. I did not feel as confident about this as the repairman did.
I got to Buffalo by 11 o’clock, and after a visit to the post office, I rode out to the E. R. Thomas automobile and motor bicycle factory. There I met Mr. F. R. Thomas for the first time, and I must pay a tribute to his generous hospitality, which I shall always remember.
The factory building is no longer standing but the front offices are, and proudly still showing the E.R Thomas name
His kindness was all the more magnanimous when it is remembered that I was riding the product of a rival maker. The first thing Mr. Thomas did was to send my bicycle inside and have it seen to that it was supplied with oil and gasoline. Then he learned that my forks were in bad shape, and he ordered men to get to work and make a new pair for it and finish them at night. The men worked in the factory until 9 o’clock that night on my forks, and had them ready for me to make an early start in the morning.
For all this Mr. Thomas. would not accept payment. In the meantime he showed me through his factory, and then lent me an Auto-Bi, on which I took a trip about the city.”
June 30, 1903 (Buffalo to Rochester, NY)
“I left Buffalo at 5:20 a.m., determined, if possible, to get to New York by July 2. and join in the endurance run to Worcester that started on the third.
After I had gone 10 miles the lacing holes in the belt broke away again. I then put on the old original belt with which I had started from San Francisco and which I had removed at Chicago. but still carried with me. Everything went finely for the next few miles, and then the connecting rod of the motor broke. Everything seemed to me to be going to pieces. There was nothing for it then but to pedal, and I churned away for five miles into Batavia.
It was only 9 a.m. when I got there, and it took until 3:30 p.m. to get the repairs made so that I could start again. I was looking for a time-related photo and found this NOT related to this story AT ALL, but this happened in Batavia in 1885, and I’m not sure how?!
It went all right until I was 12 miles from Rochester, and then the valves got to working so poorly that I could not make more than five miles an hour with it. I managed to reach a cycle store in Rochester, and there I went to work, intending to get it fixed and ride half the night to make up for lost time. The cycle store he went to was Regas, who made this interesting configuration and located in this building
It was of no use. I worked until 11 p.m., and then gave it up until morning. I realized then that the motor and bicycle were suffering from crystallization. There were no flaws or defects of any sort in the parts that were breaking. They were just giving out all at once, like the Deacon’s famous shay that lasted him so well and so long and was not weaker in any one part than in another. What George is referring to “the Deacon’s famous shay” from the 1858 poem called The Deacons Masterpiece, by Oliver Wendall Holmes Sr…and this section of it
FIRST OF NOVEMBER, — the Earthquake-day, — There are traces of age in the one-hoss shay, A general flavor of mild decay, But nothing local, as one may say. There couldn’t be, — for the Deacon’s art Had made it so like in every part That there wasn’t a chance for one to start. For the wheels were just as strong as the thills, And the floor was just as strong as the sills, And the panels just as strong as the floor, And the whipple-tree neither less nor more, And the back crossbar as strong as the fore, And spring and axle and hub encore. And yet, as a whole, it is past a doubt In another hour it will be worn out!
In spite of all my troubles, I had made 80 miles that day, and I still had hopes of being in New York in time for the fireworks.”
July 1, 1903 (Rochester to Cayuga, NY)
“It took until 11:30 o’clock the next day, July 1, to get the motor working, and then I started from Rochester with C.O. Green, superintendent of the Regas Company, and W.L. Stoneburn, the bookkeeper, riding with me as an escort.
They accompanied me 20 miles to Fairport, over roads so muddy as to be nearly impassible. Not far from Fairport, when I was alone again the hoodoo asserted itself. First the connecting rod worked loose, and soon after the belt ends gave way. I lost as little time as possible, however, and at night I reached Cayuga, with the satisfaction of having covered 70 miles during the short day.” George would spend the night here at the Mansfield Hotel, right behind the train depot at Cayuga, that building with the garage door
(Perrysburg to Cleveland, OH) “From Perrysburg I got a 7 o’clock start, but soon discovered that I did not have any more lubricating oil than enough to last for 30 miles. By economizing I managed to reach Tremont(sic Fremont) where I got some oil at a machine shop. It was so thick that I had to heat it before it would run, but it was better than nothing.
After leaving Fremont the roads began to grow very poor. There had been several days of rain on them Just before I came along and as they were simply dirty roads for repeated stretches of 10 miles or more the mud was deep and wide.
Near Amherst about 30 miles west of Cleveland I got my first reminder of the one-horse story and a foretaste of what was in store for me.
The truss on the front forks of my bicycle broke. When I stopped to remove the remains of it, I found that it had crystallized so that it was like a piece of old rusty iron. It broke in several places like a stick of rotten wood. That was the effect of the terrible pounding the machine had received over the railroad ties.
It occurred to me at the time that the whole machine must have suffered similarly, but it did not show signs of disintegrating at the time, and I concluded it would carry me to New York.
After leaving Elyria, 25 miles from Cleveland…
I struck a good sidepath that continued for 20 miles. It was only six inches wide in places, but those few inches spelled salvation for me, because the road was so heavy with sand that if I had not had the path to ride I would have had to have walked for long stretches.
Just out of Elyria I met an automobile, and it was having a hard time of it. It was all the engine could do to keep it moving.
The last five miles into Cleveland I went over the best roads I ever had ridden on anywhere in my life. It was 7 p.m. when I reached Cleveland, and my first move was to hunt up an automobile station in order to get some oil.
At the Oldsmobile branch I found what I wanted, and they gave me enough to last for 300 miles, all I cared to carry, in fact. They took a lively interest in me and my bicycle and examined my motor carefully.
Like everyone else, though, they had to be shown the photographs of my start from San Francisco before fully accepting my statement that I had come from California. My distance for this day, to Cleveland, was 121 miles, and I used five quarts of gasoline.”
June 27, 1903 (Cleveland to Conneaut, OH)
“It was on the day I left Cleveland, June 27, that my troubles began to come thick and fast. I started from Cleveland at 10 a.m. and had gone only a mile when the lacing holes in my driving belt gave way and I had to stop and relace.
For the first five miles the road was fine, and then I came to a stretch where the road was being rebuilt and I had to walk for a mile and a half. After that, I had a plank road for six miles, and then it was sandy for 30 miles, all the way to Geneva.
From there to Conneaut, 22 miles.
The road was good in places, with occasional stretches of clay and sand, through which it was hard going. It was a dreary day of travel through a pretty farming country, where the ranchers seemed to be as heavywitted as the cattle. The belt broke five times during the afternoon, and the last time I fixed it I laced It with two inches of space between the ends in order to make it reach.
I passed through town after town, where I wondered what the people did for recreation. There was nothing for them to do after their day’s work but to walk around the block and then go to bed. One thing I noticed is that it is a poor country for shoemakers for nearly everyone I saw, men, women and children, were barefooted.
It was plain that much of the country I saw was settled by immigrant farmers from Germany and other parts of Europe. I made only 75 miles this day. When I arrived in Conneaut, I got a piece of belting at a bicycle store and spliced my troublesome piece of driving leather. Then I discovered that the screws in the crankcase of the motor were all loose, so I put in some white lead and tightened them. It was so late by this time that I concluded to remain at Conneaut that night.”
June 28, 1903 (Conneaut, OH to Angola, NY)
“My hoodoo was with me all the next day. I left Conneaut at 7:30 a.m., and before I had gone quite 10 miles the oil began to leak out of the crankcase, although I had done my best to make it tight and seal it with white lead the night before.
The belt again gave out and I had my own profane troubles with these two defects all day. First it was the oil, and then the belt, and I became so disgusted before noon that I felt like shooting the whole machine full of holes and deserting it.
This was my first visit to Pennsylvania – for I been riding in the little 50-mile strip of the Keystone State that borders on Lake Erie ever since leaving Conneaut – and I can say that all my Pennsylvania experiences were hard ones.
The roads were fairly good and for most of the way I rode on footpaths at the side of the road. The view from the road with the luxuriant verdure clad bluffs on one side and the horizon bounded expanse of the great lake on the other side was as magnificent as I had seen. It reminded me of the good old Pacific.
By afternoon I had crossed the Pennsylvania strip and at last was in New York state. It seemed as if I was nearing home then, but it is a big state, and I came to realize the truth of the song that “its a blanked long walk to the gay Rialto in New York.” I didn’t have to walk, but walking would have been easier than the way I traveled from the western boundary of the Empire State to the metropolis. It was on the afternoon of June 28 that I entered the state, and it was eight days later before I got to the confines of the great city.
USGS, c.1899
That route today by the dock area
I had hoped to reach Buffalo on the day I left Conneaut but was still 25 miles from the Queen City when my troubles climaxed by the breaking of a fork side. The crystallization resulting from the continuous pounding was telling again.
I walked two miles to Angola, and there sought a telegraph office, and wired Chicago for a pair of new forks. I learned that I would not be able to get a pair there for two days, because they would have to go first to Buffalo and then be reshipped to Angola.
I therefore determined to get the forks repaired there if possible, and make them do till I got to Buffalo. It is a fortunate thing that I was not riding fast or going downhill when the fork side broke.
I was told that automobiles and motor bicycles frequently traveled the road that I took from Chicago to New York, but the behavior of the natives belied it. People all came running out of the houses when I passed, and they stared as if they never had seen a motor bicycle before.” He sought accommodations that night, and in the morning went to a “repair shop” to work on the forks. In 1903, Angola was the home of the Emblem Bicycle Manufacturing Company, on York Street. Emblem would later produce motorcycles.
The Emblem shop was here
They were in business until the ’20’s with varying levels of success in racing and risque scantily-clad female advertising
this was the Emblem racing team in 1911
George Wyman’s route so far, San Francisco to Angola NY
“In the morning I ordered and paid for some gasoline. What I got was a vile mixture of gasoline and something that was much like linseed oil. I believe it was that, but I did not discover the imposition until after I had started. and I did not go back.
A man who will sell such stuff has no conscience. Only a club will appeal to him, and I had no time to waste in fighting. I simply went on and made the best of it till I could get fresh gasoline elsewhere.
The roads were heavy from recent rains when left Kensington at 6:45 a.m., and here in the smooth and “built up” east I had to resort to the trick I learned in the deserts of Nevada and Utah. I took to the railroad track, and rode 20 miles along the ties to the lake. I saved a considerable distance by following the railroad, and as I was seasoned to such riding, the bouncing did not hurt so much as the thought that I was having the same sort of traveling east of Chicago that I had west of Omaha.
Well, it as a big country to build up and supply with good roads. Anyone who has made such a trip as I made can appreciate this in a fullness that others cannot. When this country is eventually built up with good roads it will be truly great and wonderful.
I left the railroad at Porter, Indiana, and got onto a road with a good rock bed, which lasted for several miles.
The rains, which had so severely damaged the roads, had not hurt the crops much, so far as I could see. It was all a “ranching country,” as we say in the West – farming they call it in the East – through which I was passing at this stage, and it looked flourishing.
I reached La Porte at noon, and lunched there, having made 55 miles in the forenoon. I had been keeping company with a smell like that of burning paint all the morning. It came from the mixture that I was exploding in the motor. I got fresh gasoline at La Porte, and at least had an honest smell for my money after that.
I passed through Goshen at 5 p.m.,
and reached Ligonier, where I stopped for the night, at 6:30 p.m. The roads began to get better after I left La Porte, and the last 19 miles of this day’s run were made in an hour and 10 minutes.
I thought that when I got east of Chicago folks would know what a motor bicycle is, but it was not so. In every place through which I passed, I left behind a gaping lot of natives, who ran out into the street to stare after me. When I reached Ligonier I rode through the main street, and by mistake went past the hotel where I wanted to stop.
When I turned and rode back the streets looked as though there was a circus in town. All the shopkeepers were out on the sidewalks to see the motor bicycle, and small boys were as thick as flies in a country restaurant. When I dismounted in front of the hotel the crowd became so big and the curiosity so great that I deemed it best to take the bicycle inside.
The boys manifested a desire to pull it apart to see how it was made. There was really more curiosity about my motor bicycle in the eastern towns than in the wilds of the Sierras. The mountaineers are surprised at nothing, and seemed to have caught from the Indians the self-containment that disdains to manifest the slightest curiosity.
Although when spoken to about it, the Westerners would frankly admit they never saw such a machine before, yet they turned toward me on my first appearance stolid countenances with which they gazed at the sky and the surrounding landscape. This day, when I reached Ligonier, June 24, I had made 130 miles.” Due to a 26-mile traffic jam coming out of Chicago heading to Gary IN and beyond that was at a standstill, I struggled to follow George’s route too closely and make any headway. I looked at the tent space map to see if anyone was close to where I was.
Just 30 miles due north in Sturgis, Michigan inmate @epix1718 offered me a spot, and what a spot it was. Would George think if he knew what a spaceship was this could possibly be it? What it really was a 1976 GMC Eleganza II…Stripes anyone??
So a huge thank you Pete for putting me up at very short notice, and his bulldogs are also awesome
I left in the morning, rode through Amish country and back to join George’s route…
June 25, 1903 (Ligonier, IN to Perrysburg, OH)
“At 8.a.m. On June 25 I left Ligonier and struck out over a sand road, through a rolling and fertile farming country, to Wawaka, where I came to a stone road, and had good riding to Kendallville.
East of that place, to Butler, the going was a good second to what I had in Iowa, which was the worst of anywhere that there were roads.
Between Butler and Edgerton, after having ridden 48 miles from Ligonier, I crossed the state line into Ohio. The road improved some then, but it was very bad in places all the way to Swanton. at which place I resorted to the railroad for more comfort and fewer dismounts.
I rode nine miles to Holland along the tracks, but the railroad bed was a poor one and about as rough riding as the road, so I returned to the highway and found a six-mile stretch of good road south to Miami(sic, Maumee). By taking this road I made a shortcut that saved me 15 miles, and did not therefore, see Toledo. I arrived at Perrysburg, Ohio, at 7 p.m. with 126 miles to my credit for the day.
Leaf Hotel, Perrysburg, OH c.1890
The price of gasoline continued to decrease as I got East. In the morning of that day at Ligonier I had paid 10 cents for half a gallon; at Butler I got the same quantity for 8 cents, and at Swanton the price was 7 cents.
The table board did not improve, however. For me, with my vigorous Western appetite. the bounteous supply of plain food served by the little hotels in the Rocky Mountain country was much more satisfactory than anything I got East. The meals out in Nevada and Wyoming were much better than anything I got in Illinois, Indiana or Ohio, at the same price.
Everywhere I stopped during this part of my trip a crowd gathered about me and my motorcycle, although neither the machine nor my self had any sign on telling our mission.
Whenever I told someone in a crowd I had come from San Francisco there was at first open incredulity. The word was passed along, and they winked to one another, while staring impudently at me. At this stage of my journey I had with me, however, a copy of the June issue of The Motorcycle Magazine. with the story of my start from the coast and a picture. This convinced the doubters, and immediately my bicycle became the subject of unbounded curiosity, while I was the target of Gatling-gun fire of questions that it was impossible to answer satisfactorily. The consequence was I became more particular when and where I took the trouble to convince people of my feat.
About this time I began to feel the effects of my five days’ rest in Chicago. That length of time led to me growing tender. and I was more saddle-sore at Perrysburg that night than at anytime before. I felt then as if I would have to finish with a hot water bag on the saddle.” The route so far, San Francisco to Perrysburg OH
“I was on fine stone roads by this time, and only 25 miles from Chicago. I pedaled Into the Windy City in five and a half hours the next day, June 19. As may be imagined, I was tired after pedaling 25 miles, and not only physically weary, but I was mentally dejected because of the accident to my motor. On the outskirts of the city I sat down on the curb to rest and meditate, and I was aroused by a local rider who, fancying I was in trouble, stopped to offer assistance.
I looked for a skyline photo of Chicago at the turn of the century and sadly couldn’t find one coming in from the west as I did
…but to give you a feel of Chicago at the turn of the century this is an interesting short film and gives you a slight glimpse of what George Wyman possibly saw as he entered the city
Once I was fairly in Chicago I sought to get a new motor crank, but found there was none to be had, so I telegraphed to San Francisco for one. The motor crank was the last thing that was expected to break. I had parts of every sort excepting that one along with me, and these were unused, while the one thing I could not replace was the one that broke. This showed that one never can tell what to expect in a cross-country journey of this sort.
After telegraphing for the motor crank I knew I would have to lay up in Chicago for a while, so I went out to engage lodgings. I found a nice-looking boarding house, and chose it in preference to a hotel. I engaged board for four days. When I made a light in the room, however, I found I had company – insects in the bed as big as canary birds. At least they looked that big to me. I hastily decamped with my few belongings, and walked the streets for three hours, feeling timid about making another attempt to get accommodations. “
June 20-22, 1903 (Layover in Chicago, IL)
“I was thoroughly disgusted with Chicago from that time on. I eventually went to a hotel where everything was all right, but my dislike of Chicago increased during the five days of my stay there.
It rained nearly every day, and the soot from the soft coal smoke nearly strangled me, after my being accustomed to the pure air of the mountains.
The things that impressed me most in Chicago were the way that the inhabitants ran about the streets as if they were lost or going to a fire, and the number of drunken men and women in the streets. I never saw so much drunkenness In my life anywhere before.
I went to some of the theatres, but my impression of the city was not helped by that. I simply abhorred the place.”
The Art Institute of Chicago had opened less than a decade before George Wyman’s arrival. As he was ‘stuck’ in the city for days he most likely was in the area. Nowadays if you stand across the street and admire the view while trying to not get run over, little has changed in 120 years in regards to the view.
Today’s Google Street View
…but if you look, back in 1903 standing in the middle of Adams Street facing Michigan Avenue, the road is no longer dirt and those tram lines are long gone
…why mention Adams Street? Well, Adams Street in 1926, just 23 years after George was there became the official start point of Route 66, from this point you could travel 2448 miles to the California coast at Santa Monica in a week or so, probably way beyond George’s comprehension in 1903.
If you turn your back to the AIC and look to your right there is the Route 66 sign, and very little else to signify you are at the beginning of the Mother Road. I really wanted to get my bike under the sign on the sidewalk but wow is that intersection busy and the road right there is a bus lane, plus there’s a fire hydrant and a cop just out of the shot, this will have to do!
I went up to the end of the block, took a left and rode State Street out of town…just like George I wanted out of there, it was 4.40pm and around 100c, traffic was insane.
…as George is currently broken down! Here’s some detail on his motor bicycle that the George Wyman Foundation put together –
Size Matters – Originally published April 2016
The engine size (displacement) of Wyman’s California motorcycle matters. Was it 90cc (5.5 cu.in) or 200cc (12 cu.in). Both sizes have been widely reported in connection with the Wyman California. Our research team has been examining this issue to determine the likely displacement of the California that carried Wyman, with all his gear, 3,800 miles across America.
It is unlikely a 90cc displacement would produce 1.25-Horsepower often attributed to his motorcycle. Here is a quote from an article written for the Wikipedia Motorized Bicycle page…
“Other sources state that the Marks engine in the California was only 90 cc in displacement, but a 1901-vintage 90 cc low-compression four-cycle engine running the 30-octane gasoline of the day was unlikely to generate 1.5 horsepower and 25 mph on the California, which weighed some 75-80 pounds, not counting fuel, oil, and rider.” Rafferty, Tod, The Complete Illustrated Encyclopedia of American Motorcycles, Philadelphia, PA: Courage Books, page 22.
The motorcycle Wyman used to ride from San Francisco to New York City has been identified as a 1902 California designed by Roy C. Marks, of the California Motor Company. It could have been a Regular 1903 Model California. In 1902, Wyman acquired (bought?) a California. He rode it from San Francisco, over the Sierra Nevada Mountains, to Reno and back that summer. This ride inspired him to attempt a transcontinental journey across the United States. Since Wyman and the CMC were both in San Francisco, he may have collaborated with the CMC on the project. Either to get the bike he rode to Reno in tip-top shape and modifying it for the trip across the country. Or, CMC provided him with the latest model in exchange for promotional rights. (We are conducting research to shed more light on this issue.)
On September 30, 1902, Marks was granted two US Patents for his designs:
There is no mention of the displacement of the cylinder volume not occupied by the piston in the description of Marks’ design. This is not unusual, though. It would be to his advantage to not specify the size of the engine, allowing for future size changes in the applied for design. Figure 2, depicts the motor cylinder showing the internal space of the combustion chamber.
An examination of the diagram above indicates the volume of the cylinder, not occupied by the piston, to be about 60% to 65% of the total volume between the bottom of the cylinder and the top of the head assembly. We will use 62.5% in our calculation.
Comparing the Wyman motorcycle with the 1902 California in the Dave Scoffone collection provides the opportunity to examine the relative size differences between motor cylinders. Even with the slight viewing angle difference the cylinders appear to be identical, right down to the number of heat transfer fins. A cylinder of 90cc displacement would be noticeably more slender or roughly half the size.
1902 California today and “Snip” of Broken Belt Photo Dave measured the cylinder of the 1902 California in his collection. The length from the base of the cylinder to the head assembly is 6 inches. The circumference of the outside wall at the base of the cylinder, below the heat fins, is 9.5 inches. The cylinder walls of the patent diagram appear to be 3/8 or 1/2 inches thick, given a 6-inch length. For our gross calculation, we will use 1/2 inch. The formula for calculating the volume of a cylinder is: V = pi r^2 (length), given the cylinder….
Length: 6 inches
Outer circumference: 9.5 inches
Outer diameter: 3.03 = 9.5 divided by 3.14
Cylinder wall thickness: .5 inches
Inside diameter: 2.03 = 3.03 minus 1 inch for cylinder wall thickness
Inside radius: 1.015 = 2.03 divided by 2
therefore…
Volume cylinder: 19.32 = 3.14 times (1.015^2) times 6
Displacement: 12.08 cu in. = 19.32 times 62.5% of total cylinder volume not occupied by the piston.
It is conclusive to our research team that the engine size of Wyman’s motorcycle was not 90cc (5.5 cu.in), but 200cc. Going forward, the Project will refer to Wyman’s motor bicycle as being a 200cc, 1.25-horsepower 1902 California motorcycle.
June 23, 1903 (Chicago to Kensington, IL)
“It was not until the morning of this day, June 23, that I got my new motor crank by express, and it took me nearly all day to fit it and get the engine together again. I lost no time in getting away from the Windy City. I did not want to stop there one hour longer than I was obliged to do. I left there that same evening.
I would “blow in” to New York in a week or so. The worst roads I knew must surely be behind me, and, with better highways, I calculated that I would have no more trouble with my motor bicycle. I reckoned without thought of the cumulative effects of the continuous battering that the machine was receiving. It has proven itself a wonderfully staunch steed, but no vehicle could stand what I imposed upon the 90-pound vehicle, nor should any be expected to do so.
Before I got through with my trip I had, as will he seen, a vivid personal experience that put me into thorough sympathy with the Deacon and his one-horse shay.
As I have said, I did not want to remain in Chicago one minute longer than was necessary. and accordingly I left there at 5:30 p.m., on June 23, and made my way to Kensington, 23 miles east.”
“At Ogden I found a blacksmith, and had him cut a new thread on my rear axle, and we wedged the lock-nut of the coaster on with pieces of brass so that it would act properly. So you understand what a coaster is, here is an ad from 1903
Ogden is in a fine farming district on rolling land, and going out of the place there it fine view across the mountains. I had a good chance to look around, for it was 11:30 o’clock before I got my coaster brake fixed so that I could start.
I rode 11 miles on the road to Boone, a town with model asphalted streets, and there I had luncheon, after which I sought the railroad tracks. Boone
After a while I met a section foreman, in the person of a big Swede, who ordered me off the track bed. No amount of blarney would persuade him even to let me continue to a crossroad. I must get off the railroad property right then and there. The harshness of this edict became apparent when I had to climb through a barbed wire fence, drag my motor cycle after me and then walk with it for half a mile through a grain field before I reached a road. The prospect of being caught by the farmer while I was in the act of trampling down his grain did not add to my cheerfulness of mind during this enforced detour.
Shortly after I got started at riding on the road again my wheel twisted in a rut and I fell in a heap with the machine. In this fall I broke my cyclometer, the fourth one smashed since leaving San Francisco.
I had been thoroughly subdued by my two days experience with the Iowa gumbo, and I did not swear over this mishap. I was taking everything with becoming humility by this time, and my most fervent hope was simply that it would not rain until I got safely out of the country.
Fortunately it had not rained since I left Council Bluffs, and the mud I was encountering was simply that left over from the flooding storms of the previous week. I knew that if it rained before I got out of the region I would be laid up for days, for the roads get so bad during a rain that horses cannot make their way along them. Horses have been stuck in the roads out that way so badly that it was necessary to hoist them out with tackle.
After my fall I returned to the railroad tracks, determined to take a chance with the section hands in preference to the chances of the road. I had no more difficulty with the railroad men, and eventually reached Marshalltown at 7 p.m. with 71 miles to my credit for the day.
I overnighted just outside Marshalltown, finding a wild camping spot by a lake
By following the railroad tracks I missed passing through Des Moines, which is on a spur of the road down from Ames. At Ames I stopped and got a new screw for my carburetor valve, which was damaged by the same fall that broke my cyclometer. In Ames, the railroad depot is now a coffee shop and the railroad has gone!
At Marshalltown I registered at a hotel run by a widow and her sons. After supper I gave my belt a lacing and went to bed.” The hotel has long gone, just a waypoint marker in its place
June 16, 1903 (Marshalltown to Clinton, IA)
“With my nerve fortified by a resolve to brazen it out with the section hands on the railroad, and a stock of interesting stories arranged in mind for their benefit, I left Marshalltown at 7 a.m. on July 16, and proceeded to the tracks of the Northwestern.
Imagine a man so anxious to ride a bicycle over railroad ties that he would lie awake at night planning how to prevaricate to the section men! My luck in the gentle art of telling fairy stories was variable. Some passed me on with a doubtful look, but others were rude enough to refuse me credence and order me “back to the highway.”
Although I was east of there, I was like the man going to Omaha, who persistently returned after being put off the railroad train. Some section bosses and track walkers I went past, others I went around, and by using road and rail bed alternately I kept making headway. In this section of the country I saw more Indians than I did in all that portion of the country west of the Missouri.
There is a reservation at Tama, Iowa…As I rode through Tama it appeared a Powwow was starting the next day, and even though I was on a dirt road there was heavy traffic and I got a few unwelcoming looks as I rode through the reservation even though it was a public road.
For those who aren’t sure what a Powwow is –
through which place I passed and most of the Indians I saw were from there. They were tame redskins, given to the wearing of shirts and coats and trousers, and to agricultural pursuits. In fact, one sees few blanket Indians in this locality. Once, while I was on the road I tried to get a snapshot of one of the parties of Indians that I met in wagons.
There was a squaw in the party, and she yowled like a coyote when I pointed the camera at her and made haste to cover herself with a blanket, for most of the Indians have not gotten over the superstition that, like the man’s watch in the photograph gallery, their soul is taken in any picture of them. This squaw waved her arms and threw herself about so that I thought she would fall. I persevered, however, and got a snapshot; although it was an unsatisfactory one, because, after all, it shows only the Indian lady seated in the wagon with a blanket over her head.
Five miles from Cedar Rapids my batteries got so weak that my motor began to miss and finally gave out. When I tried to pedal the clumsily repaired coaster brake it broke again and I had to walk into Cedar Rapids.
The rapids, which I passed as I entered the city, were pretty, but I, plodding along and pushing my bicycle envied their rapidity more than their beauty. I traveled about 77 miles this day, though the distance by rail from Marshalltown to Cedar Rapids is only 69 miles.
When I reached Cedar Rapids my bicycle needed attention more seriously than at any previous time, and this was not to be wondered at, for it had carried me more than 2,300 miles. I went to a bicycle store on Second Avenue where I soldered the loose sprocket lock nut on to the hub. My handlebars were cracked near the head, where holes are drilled for the wires, so I brazed a piece of reinforcing onto them. even though George doesn’t mention the name of the shop, by his description, address, and town records, it was easy to assume he went to Hall Bicycle Company.
Hall Bicycle Co. 2nd Ave. Cedar Rapids, IA c.1903
Sadly even though the sign on the door said they opened at 10 am, I waited until 10.30 and no one showed. I was told that they moved not long after George was here to the new location just down the street, and the current owner is a relative of the original owner!
*Photo taken through the window
*The ‘new location’ just down the street
Leaving Cedar Rapids, I found the roads still muddy, and, as the country is of rolling character, I sought the railroad, but I found the bed so strewn with sharp rocks that I returned to the wagon road.
Why I did not get lost several times In this country I do not know. The telegraph poles branched off at every crossroad, and it was simply a toss-up to decide which was the line of poles to follow. The roads were a little better east of Cedar Rapids, which itself has splendid roads, but they were still wet and in places sandy.
Darkness overtook me before I reached Clinton, and, being afraid of smashing into something. I walked the last few miles into that place, arriving at 9 p.m., after having covered 85 miles.”
The bridge at Clinton
June 17, 1903 (Clinton, IA)
Wyman did not account for his activities on June 17, 1903. In the passage below, he states he departed the Stoddart Hotel in Marshalltown at 7 am, Tuesday, on “July 16″(sic – should be June 16), clearly a transcription error that made into the September 1903 issue of The Motorcycle Magazine. (See page 145, right column, last paragraph)
“With my nerve fortified by a resolve to brazen it out with the section hands on the railroad, and a stock of interesting stories arranged in mind for their benefit, I left Marshalltown at 7 a.m. on July 16, and proceeded to the tracks of the Northwestern.”
It is likely Wyman remained overnight in Cedar Rapids, repairing his motorcycle at Hall Bicycle Company on Second Avenue. Then finding overnight accommodations, departing for Clinton on the 17th of June.. It was over “77 miles” from Marshalltown to Cedar Rapids. And, another 85 miles from Cedar Rapids to Clinton. Wyman cites his daily mileage, likely traveled on June 17th.
“Darkness overtook me before I reached Clinton, and, being afraid of smashing into something. I walked the last few miles into that place, arriving at 9 p.m., after having covered eighty-five miles.”
Wyman’s next date/time reference is when he departs Clinton at 6:30 am on June 18, heading north to cross the Mississippi over the “Lyons-Fulton Bridge.” There is another transcription error in the reference to “Dixon” instead of Clinton. Dixon is community east of and after going through Fulton, just across the Mississippi river. Wyman goes on to mention “Fulton” correctly in the passage below. (See page 147, first full paragraph)
“At Clinton I was nearing Chicago, within 150 miles of it, and on the morning of June 18, when I left Clinton, Ia, at 6:30 a.m., I hoped to reach it before noon on the following day. Shortly after leaving Dixon(sic. Clinton) about two miles,
I crossed the “Father of Waters” and was at last east of the Mississippi and into Illinois, where I was told at the start I never would get with my motor bicycle. The roads improved at once after crossing the great river, though I had some difficulty finding the correct one going out of Fulton, Illinois.”
It is remarkable there are relatively so few transcription errors in the whole of the Wyman narrative. If you think of the communication flow-process that was necessary to end in the final printed copies of The Motorcycle Magazine articles.
Wyman would have to keep a journal of his daily progress, noting dates, times, locations and a descriptive narrative about activities. He also had with him a Kodak Vest Pocket camera that he used to take pictures along the way.
At the end of each riding day, after tending to the motorcycle, getting fed and securing lodging, he would compile his notes into a narrative suitable for publication. Then, depending on the telegraph, telephone and postal services available in the place he stopped for the night, he had to package it up and send it to Goodman Company publishing facilities in San Francisco and/or New York City. He never mentions getting film developed so one can assume it was sent to the publisher for processing. Also, we imagine the editorial staff at the Goodman Company offices would polish the narratives before sending the copy to the press for typesetting and printing. So, the opportunity for “copy errors” were ever present.
June 18, 1903 (Clinton, IA to Naperville, IL)
“At Clinton I was nearing Chicago, within 150 miles of it, and on the morning of June 18, Clinton today, it gave off a bad vibe IMO, this was potentially a stopover as there was a hotel in this section of buildings, today just derelict shells
when I left Clinton, Ia, at 6:30 a.m., I hoped to reach it before noon on the following day. Shortly after leaving Dixon(sic. Clinton) about two miles, I crossed the “Father of Waters” and was at last east of the Mississippi and into Illinois, where I was told at the start I never would get with my motor bicycle.
The roads improved at once after crossing the great river, though I had some difficulty finding the correct one going out of Fulton, Illinois. The country in general also improved. The soil was darker and more fertile looking, and the farms had a thriving look about them that was superior to anything I had seen since leaving Sacramento. I chose the road on the north side of the Rock River, and remained on that side until I crossed the river at Dixon.
Persons of whom I made inquiry at Dixon advised me that the best thing I could do was to take the old Chicago stage road. I did so, and that road will be ever memorable to me, for on it my troubles broke out afresh. I rode from Dixon, which Is 99 miles from Chicago. Southeast about 45 miles to Earlville, and then rode northeast about 25 miles toward Aurora. On this same route, I stopped for gas, I was just about to start the bike when I heard this ungodly engine noise coming towards me, and it was this guy. We got chatting, he was riding a 49cc with ‘upgraded heads’ he told me. “It’ll do 29mph at a push, but if I do that too long my MPG drops from 300 a gallon to about 250 miles!”
He like every other person I spoke to had not heard of George Wyman, but he did make a statement that struck me as profound and he was as shocked at my answer as much as I was.
“So you’re riding coast to coast on this guy’s 120th anniversary, how many thousands of others are celebrating that amazing achievement and also riding coast to coast?” – “None that I know of!” “…huh, what, NONE…that’s just shameful…!”
A great part of the road was so poor that I wished I had stayed on the railroad, and I learned afterward that I might have ridden on roads much nearer the tracks. Still, other parts of the road were good and I made fair time. I was getting near Aurora when the crank of my motor broke. This was the most serious accident that had happened to me, and it meant trouble. There was no possible way of repairing the damage, so, like the steamer that breaks its engine and hoists sail, I resorted to the pedals, and mighty glad I was that I had fixed the coaster brake at Cedar Rapids, so that I could pedal and did not have to walk. I pedaled about 10 miles before nightfall, and then put up at a little store at a crossroads, where they gave me accommodation for the night.” Route so far, San Francisco to Aurora IL
“I left Maxwell at 7:15 a.m. on June 9, and followed the wagon road for the first eight miles. Then it got so sandy that I took to the railroad. I remained on the tracks for 12 miles, and then tried the road again. After an hour on it, the mud began to be so thick that riding was impossible, and I then returned to the railroad and stuck to it until I reached Lexington, where I had dinner.
When I emerged from the dining room it was raining so hard that it would have been folly to have attempted to ride. My batteries required attention, and by chance I met J.S. Bancroft, who has the most complete bicycle and automobile repairing station that I saw between Cheyenne and Omaha.
Mr. Bancroft stopped when he saw me at work on the batteries and invited me to his store. He is a motor bicycle rider, using a 2 1/2-horsepower Columbia. ** Columbia, a short-lived motorcycle brand 1902–1905 based in Chicago, Illinois)
I lost an afternoon in Lexington, but it stopped raining at 5 p.m., and I went over to the railroad and made a run of 20 miles in an hour and a half to Elm Creek,
where I had supper. I was anxious to make all the mileage I could, so after supper I started again, and by 8:20 p.m. I had ridden 16 miles more and was at Kearney, where I put up for the night. I had a fall and broke my ammeter in this last stretch. I had the same experience with my watch back in Nevada.
A note in my diary, made at Kearney reads: ‘There are some of the greatest pace followers of their size in the world in this region. A bunch tacked on to me back at Ogallala, and for two days I have been unable to shake them. It looks as if they will stay with me all the way into New York. The natives call them gnats. They bite like hornets.’ “
June 10, 1903 (Kearney to Columbus, NE)
“The roads were still impassible going out of Kearney, and I followed the railroad tracks to Grand Island, and even then I had to walk over several short stretches where it was sandy, and every half mile I had to dismount for the crossing of the wagon road, the highway being in such vile condition that its dirt was piled upon the tracks so that I could not ride through it. I just happened to pass a life-size model of a wagon he refers to
In the 11 miles between Grand Island and Chapman, where I stopped for dinner, I broke six spokes. I rode, with the rear wheel thus weakened, over the ties 10 miles to Central City, where I stopped for repairs. President Roosevelt just a few weeks before was in Grand Island breaking ground for the new Carnegie Library, so construction would have been happening as he rode by. Today it is a Century 21 real estate office!!!
I left Central City at 4:45, This was my view leaving Central City, most likely the same dirt road George used, I was told to get off it by railroad workers…seems very little has changed.
and rode 44 miles to Columbus, arriving there at 8:25 p.m.
This made 108 miles for the day and I felt satisfied. On this day again I narrowly escaped being lifted from the roadbed by an engine pilot. It was a fast mail train this time. I was riding along outside the rail, where the space between the rail and edge of the embankment was only six inches, and I could not look around without danger of banging into the rail or slipping over the edge. I did not hear the train until the whistle sounded, when the engine was within 100 feet of me. I just went down that embankment as if I had been pushed.”
Sadly the train depot has long gone and all that remains is a dirt lot
June 11, 1903 (Columbus to Omaha, NE)
“I left Columbus, Nebraska at 7:40 a.m. My start was later than usual, because I had to wait to get gasolene. They do not keep it in the stores there, but a wagon goes around in the morning to the various houses and supplies what they want for the day.
I had to take to the railroad once more from the outset. After going 28 miles over the ties I noticed that the roads looked better, and I rode on them for the rest of the day, stopping at Fremont for dinner and arriving at Omaha at 5:30 p.m.
At Omaha I feel that my self-imposed task was as good as accommodated. The roughest and most trying part of the country has been crossed, and I have traveled more than 2,000 miles of the total distance. I have reached the great waters of the Missouri; the promised land of the East, where I hope to find good roads, lies ahead of me. My anticipations of what lies before me are bright.”
June 12, 1903 (Omaha, NE to Council Bluffs, IA)
“Although it was evening when I reached Omaha, Nebraska, on June 11, I at once hunted up the largest bicycle store and repair shop I could find in the city – that of Louis Flescher, 1622 Capitol Avenue – and began putting my machine in trim for the last 1,600 miles of my trip.
Louis Flescher’s shop is long gone and in its place is America’s favorite institution…the I.R.S.
I found that six new spokes were needed, and, after putting them in and truing up the wheels, I put on a new belt rim to replace the old one, which had been literally chewed up by the rocks along the road.
It looked, in fact, as if it might have been a rail on the manger of a cribbing horse. Also, I put on the second one of the pair of tires that I got at Ogden and soldered up a small leak in the gasoline tank.
Knowing that from that time on I would be able to get almost anything I needed, I decided to remove my carrier, with its extra gasoline tank and tools, and ship them to Chicago. I kept only a pump, a tire repair outfit, a wrench, a spark plug and my lubricating oil. All this was not done at night. It took me until 1:30 o’clock the next day to finish my work, and then I had lunch.
It was three o’clock on June 12 when I left Omaha. The streets of that city are fine, many of them having vitrified brick pavement. It might have been all imagination, or the exhilaration I felt at leaving the deserts and the Rockies behind me, but the bicycle seemed to skim the earth like a swallow as I started for the steel bridge across the Missouri River to Council Bluffs, Iowa. The Omaha Express Office is now The Durham Museum, and I arrived too late to go inside!
The carrier and its freight made the load lighter, and the fine pavement had much to do with it, but the difference seemed greater than could be accounted for by these things. At the time it seemed to me as if I was having the finest ride of my lifetime.
Unwitting I cheated the toll collector at the bridge and crossed over into Iowa without paying anything. I was going at a smart pace when I reached the bridge and had gone along on it some distance when I heard a man shouting to me. I learned afterward that he was the toll collector. I glanced back and saw him waving his arm excitedly, but at the time I thought he was expostulating because I was riding between the tracks, so I kept on and, as far as l am aware he did not undertake to pursue me or have me stopped.
At Council Bluffs I made the acquaintance of Mr. Smith, of the Nebraska Cycle Company, who has traveled all over the country. He sent the barometer of my new-born confidence and enthusiasm down.
From what he told me of the roads and the condition in which I would find them at that time, after all the rainy weather, I about made up my mind that I would have to ride on the railroad ties all the way to Chicago.
Perhaps it was the effect of what he said that led me to explore Council Bluffs to a greater extent than I had any other place through which I passed, though, truth to tell, there was not opportunity for exploring in more than a very few, most of my stops west of Omaha having been at places that could be seen at one glance – “tout ensemble,” as the Frenchmen say.
The brick pavement of the Council Bluffs streets is superior to anything I ever saw before and I have seen some fine roads in *Australia and other countries. It is laid with such scientific method and such consummate art that you might think you were riding on a board floor when rolling over it. *George Wyman was the first American to circumnavigate Australia on a bicycle, that was done before this ride
It had been my design when I started to take the more southerly route from Omaha, by way of Kansas City and St. Louis to Chicago, because I understood that, although the distance Is greater, I would find better riding by so doing. When I came along, however, all that country was under water, one might say, so I decided to follow the route of the Northwestern Railroad past Ames, from which a spur of the road runs south to Des Moines.
For the credit of the country, I hope the southerly route is better than the one I followed. On the whole, Iowa gave me as much vile traveling as any State that I crossed.” The route so far, San Francisco to Council Bluffs, IA
“I left Council Bluffs at 6:30 a.m. on June 13, and, in spite of what Mr. Smith had told me, I felt glad to know that I had crossed the Missouri, for, with the “Big Muddy” at my back, my journey was two-thirds over. I started on the roadway and followed it nearly 40 miles to Woodbine.
This is Woodbine today…there might have been a little corn around
The June floods had preceded me surely enough and the roads were so muddy that I could hardly force the bicycle along. I took a snapshot of my bicycle in one place where it was kept upright by the mud.
G.Wyman I was a little luckier…
Where the roadbed was not muddy it had dried with deep ruts and “thank you, ma’ams” in it.
I frequently had to get off and walk for short stretches, wading through the mud or getting over the ruts. I had gone about 10 miles from Council Bluffs, riding and walking alternately, when I got off to foot it past a bad piece, and discovered that the jolting over the rough places had loosened the bundle in which I had my tools and parts and they were all gone.
I did not care to leave my bicycle by the roadside for any tramp or small boy who might come along to fool with, so I trundled it along back with me hunting in the mud for my lost tools.
I do not believe in profanity, but my unbelief in this respect was greatly helped by the experience. In the course of two miles I recovered everything except the pump connection and a small bundle of battery wire.
After regaining my tools and starting to ride again I had not gone a mile before I ran into a rut and the machine slewed and hurled me into a slough of mud about 10 feet away. The mud along that part of the world is of the gumbo variety, that sticks like glue when it is moist and dries as hard and solid as bricks.
I held quite a good sized tract of Iowa real estate when I arose, but I reflected that it was better to have landed in a soft spot than it would have been to have struck a place where the flinty ruts were sticking up five inches like cleavers with ragged edges.
This philosophical reflection served to modify my exclamations at the time, and I went on carrying the mud as a badge of membership in the grand order of hoboes, to which I felt at this time that I belonged. Nor was the mud, both wet and dry, the sum of my troubles.
It was a rolling country, with plenty of farms about. Through which I was traveling, and I met quite a number of wagons. Motor vehicles of any sort are not common enough thereabouts as yet for the horses to be unafraid of them. Eight out of ten horses I met wanted to climb a telegraph pole or leap the fence at the sight and sound of my harmless little vehicle, and the farmers used language that would make a pirate blush. I was frankly expecting any one of them to pull a gun and take a shot at me during all my 40 miles on the road that forenoon.
One experience of the road that day, in which I tried to play the part of a gallant, mud-covered though I was, but succeeded only in becoming unpopular and ridiculous, occurred when I met a buggy containing a couple of maiden ladies past the boom of youth.
At an eighth of a mile away or more, the animal they were driving began to cavort and show insane alarm. The women screamed, and I dismounted as quickly as I could, and laid the bicycle down in the gully at the roadside. One of the women got out and tried to lead the animal. He did not lead very well, either, and I approached, intending to take him by the bridle, quiet him and then let the lady return to the seat and remain there while I led the refractory brute.
Usually I get along well with horses, but this one went crazy when I got near him. He acted like a rocking horse, standing first on his hind legs and then on his front ones, and kicking out in the rear to the accompanying screams of the women. I supposed I smelled motory or looked it. At any rate, he would not be quiet as long as I tried to hold him, and I had to shamefacedly retire from view and let the spinster return to his head.
I felt foolish, and must have looked it, for the woman in the carriage glared at me with manifest contempt and indignation while her partner in single blessedness led their good steed forward. The beast did a hornpipe as he passed the place where my bicycle lay in the gully, and the last I saw of him he was ambling along and shying every 10 yards after both women were again in the buggy. I started on my journey again, wondering if they bred fool horses especially for old maids in that region.
G.Wyman
About 20 miles from Omaha, at Lovelands, I took a picture of an orchard and field still under water from the rains. This was not the only place of the sort by a great deal, but it gives an idea of how the country suffered and how I suffered.
At Woodbine I concluded to take to the railroad tracks to escape the affectionate hugging of the gumbo mud and the objurgations of the farmers, a number of whom told me I “ought to keep that thing off the road altogether.”
I went on the tracks of the Northwestern, and had not ridden far before I was ordered off by a section boss. This was the first time this thing happened to me, but it was not the last time. The railroad waves in and between the bluffs there, so that there is hardly a straightaway stretch a hundred yards long, and it is because of the danger due to the many sharp curves that no one is allowed on the tracks.
I hadn’t mentioned this before, but because this route so closely follows the railroad you are in constant earshot of trains, and they run at all hours.
Sleeping in a tent (for me along the way) was interrupted multiple times a night as they passed crossings blowing their horns. I’m guessing in the 1900s trains only ran in daylight hours so George was more well-rested than me, but for sure needed it traversing the country the way he was.
After making a detour through the fields, I returned to the tracks, but I was chased off a second time, and then I shifted my route over to the tracks of the Illinois Central about 50 feet the other side of the Northwestern rails, and I had no more trouble with the section bosses.
I reached Denison at 8 p.m., after covering only 75 miles in 13½ hours. I found a comfortable commercial hotel, with modern improvements, at Denison, and had It not been for the roads I would have thought I was well out of the wilderness. I had to have my driving belt sewed again that night, and it was midnight before I went to bed.”
June 14, 1903 (Denison to Ogden, IA)
“I started from Denison at 8 a.m., taking to the railroad. After going five miles the roadbed became so bad that I could not ride, and I sought the highway. This did not help me much, for I was able to ride only a little way at a time, and then walk anywhere from 100 yards to a mile. My coaster brake, which had begun to give me trouble the day before, became on this day a coaster broke. The threads of the axle were stripped, and, while the brake would not work, the coaster worked overtime, so that I could not start the bicycle by pedaling; I had to run it along and then hop on.
This day, July 14, was the hottest I had yet encountered. My clothing was drenched with perspiration, and it was hard to decide whether it was easier and cooler walking or riding.
I hated the task of dismounting every half mile, walking in the gumbo mud and pulling my feet out at each step as if I was breaking them away from the hold of a rubber rope; yet when I was walking it seemed about as easy to keep at it as to start the motor by running along with it and jumping on, knowing that I was apt to fall immediately, as I did several times because of the ruts, and knowing, also, that if I did not fall as soon as I mounted that I was likely to be compelled to dismount after going 500 yards.
One fall that I got through performing this stunt of running with the bicycle and jumping aboard on the rutty road nearly laid me up, I fell and struck my knee so hard that I had to sit down and nurse my strength for a quarter of an hour. My leg was lame for a couple of days. It was all I could do to keep going, and had the blow been a little harder I would have been crippled.
It may be tiresome to react about the hard luck passages of my trip, but it is less tiresome than enduring them; arid they all come back to me so vividly that the story would seem incomplete without some of these mishaps. At best, the hard knocks pale in description. and I try to state them mildly. In actual fact, some of them were sources of real agony.
It was not a sentimental journey at any stage, nor a humorous one, and often I was too sadly used up to perceive what humor there might have been in a situation, though usually I am not slow in catching any glint of humor there may be abroad. I must have appeared comical at many times, but unfortunately we have not been blessed by the gods with the gift “to see ourselves as others see us,” and so missed many a laugh and smile at my own appearance.
A part of the aggravation of this hot day was due to the remarks of those I met on the road. “What’s the trouble?” “Puncture?” “Motor busted, eh?” These were some of the queries and comments I had hurled at me as I floundered along through the mud.
Sometimes the remarks were uttered from sincere solicitude, sometimes from mere curiosity, and occasionally from a desire to ridicule. “Why don’t you ride?” was several times asked by persons who really did not understand why a motor bicycle could not go through anything.
There is, in fact, a great deal of ignorance still remaining among the farmer folk as to the limitations of a bicycle. They seem sometimes to think that it must be able to skim on the surface of sand and mud, run through water, or on a telegraph wire, or anywhere; yet, on the other hand, there is great incredulity as to the ability of anyone going any great distance.
The worst taunt I got while walking and pushing the bicycle came from a grizzled farmer old enough to be more polite to strangers.
He called out: “Hey, young fel’! Is it any easier walkin’ in that gumbo when yer push one o’ them things along-side?” The paradoxical ideas of the farmers about my bicycle were revealed in the evening when I arrived at a small place called Ogden after covering 76 miles.
Walnut Street today
While I was talking about my trip and telling of the troubles of the daunting journey there were several expressions of disbelief in my story of having come from San Francisco, and I was told that I couldn’t get to Chicago with a “little thing like that.”
At almost the same time a man solemnly asked me why I didn’t avoid all the bad going by riding on the steel rail, he having no doubt of the ability of a me to ride right along on a rail without any attachment.”
“The next morning I washed and pinned up my rags as best I could and went out to replenish my wardrobe. I must indeed have been a tough-looking specimen the night before, because the first place I went into in the morning, a furnishing store, the dog growled at me savagely and disputed my entrance until called off by his owner.
It rained hard all day, and I remained in Cheyenne. while there I weighed myself and found that I was 12 pounds under my normal weight, the scales tipping at 141 pounds. I spent most of the day cleaning and fixing my wheel. Again, I aimed a hose on it, and after that I had to use a scraper and brushes before I could get down to work with a rag. I worked in the bicycle shop of G.D Pratt while there, and he extended me every courtesy.” The bicycle shop is no longer there, a modern Wells Fargo bank building has replaced it.
There was only a handful of hotels in town in 1903, one of the better ones was the Pioneer, and it’s just a few hundred feet away, there is a good chance George stayed there.
His short walk across the W. 17th St to Capitol Ave, this would have been George’s view
“It was raining a little when I left Cheyenne, and the roads were too heavy to ride. I took to the railroad again, and the railroad ties were not much better than the road. For 43 miles I had to pedal.
If you ever went for a ride on a tandem and took your best girl, or some other fellow’s best girl, and she was a heavyweight, and about 30 miles from home she gave out and you had to do all the pushing to get home, you have a slight idea how I felt pushing the motor over the railroad ties.
I got to Egbert at 12:45 and had dinner at the section house there.
It is downhill all the way now. I have turned my back upon the Rockies and their grandeur and am nearing the great prairie lands. I can see Elk Mountain, which, with its snow-capped peak is a landmark for hundreds of miles around and in spite of the troubles I have had in the rocky country, I feel somewhat regretful at leaving it.
I do not know what troubles the prairies hold for me, and I shall miss the inspiration of the mountain air, the gorgeous view, and the coyotes and the glimpses of antelope that I caught a couple of times back near Laramie.
One new sight I do have is that of prairie dogs, and as they sit beside their holes and yelp at me I take several pot shots at them. They dodge into their burrows so quickly that you cannot tell whether you hit them or not: even when shot through the head or heart these creatures dodge into their holes to die.
It began to rain when I had gone a mile and a half from the station house, and, remembering my last experience with the rain and the gumbo mud, I turned back and waited at the telegraph operating room until the middle of the afternoon, when the rain slackened.
I got to Pine Bluffs on the state line between Wyoming and Nebraska, at 4:40 p.m. To furnish an idea of how rapidly I have come down it may be mentioned that at Pine Bluffs the elevation is 5,038 feet, and this is only 90 miles from the summit, where the elevation is 8,590 feet, a drop of 3,500 feet in less than 100 miles.
During my first few miles of travel in the state of Nebraska I was nearly killed by a freight train. l was riding alongside the track, close to the outer rail, where the dirt over the ties is level, and a strong wind was blowing in my face, so that I did not hear the rumble of the train.
Suddenly I heard the loud shriek of the whistle right in my ears. I looked back and the train was not more than 10 yards away. I just had time to shoot down the embankment, which, luckily, was only about four feet high at that place when the train ran past me.
As it was, the engineer had whistled “down brakes” and was scared himself. It is fortunate that I was not riding between the tracks at the time, or I would have surely had to sacrifice my bicycle to escape with my life. If it had been a fast passenger train and got that close to me, it would have hit me before I got out of the way.
This was worse than the mountains, for nothing that happened there came so near to causing heart failure. I got to Kimball, 65 miles from Cheyenne at 6:50 p.m.
Kimball NE
They told me there that the roads are good when it is not raining. I had to take their word for it, and conclude that I still carry some sort of a hoodoo with me, in spite of having shed my fancy waistcoat, for when I get into a region of good roads it rains and spoils them, and when it doesn’t rain I am in a district where the roads are never good.”
June 7, 1903 (Kimball to Ogallala, NE)
“On Sunday morning, June 7, I left Kimball, Nebraska, and made the biggest day’s run that I scored west of the Mississippi. It is a fine, grain-growing country that I rode through from Kimball, which is a prosperous town. For the first 12 miles the country was rolling and the roads sandy.
After that I found good hard roads all the way to Sidney, 35 miles from Kimball, and I made it in just three hours, reaching Sidney at 10:15. I stopped for gas here and the adjacent building had this old Honda advertisement painted on its wall, made me wish I was on the Postie bike and its gargantuan 8 hp
When I rode into the place, which is a division town, I passed as tough a bunch of citizens as I met all through the West. They were young fellows loafing on a corner, and they tossed all manner of taunting comment at me, as if inviting trouble. I kept on my way without replying, which was wise, but not easy to do. After getting some gasolene(sic), I left at 10:30, and had no trouble making Chappell at 12:15, where I had dinner.
G.Wyman
I started again at 1:07 p.m., and quickly found that the good road was at an end. It became so bad, in fact, that I took to the railroad and rode the ties most of the way into Ogallala, 114 miles from Kimball.
Of this distance I made the first 65 miles in five hours, and had I had as good going in the afternoon as I had in the morning, I would have made 140 miles.
It began to rain shortly before I got to Ogallala, and I had to pedal over the last 15 miles. Of the 114 miles I made this day, 46 were ridden in the State of Colorado, for the railroad and road both put in a bend from Chappell southward to get to the South Platte River at Julesburg, Colorado and then the road follows the river valley back again into Nebraska; so that 46 miles was all of Colorado I saw.
This is the Railroad depot in Julesburg today
…back into Nebraska…
I found one good stretch of road five miles long in the 46 and this was a relief from the railroad ties so I blessed it and took a snapshot of it for a Colorado souvenir.
Ogallala is only a “little jerkwater station,” as they say in this country, but it was nightfall when I reached there, and it was raining hard, so I put up there for the night.”
June 8, 1903 (Ogallala to Maxwell, NE)
“It is now the time of the heavy rains, cloudbursts and freshets that devastated so much of the Western country during the month of June. It is my luck to be right in the particular great basin where the waters flow most copiously.
At Ogallala, Nebraska, I was told that there had been nothing but rain there for the last two weeks. The roads were in terrible condition, I know, when I left there at 6:45 o’clock, on the morning of June 8. After 10 miles of heavy going through the mud, I struck sand, and then took to the railroad track once more.
After going six miles over the ties it began to rain so hard that I had to get off and walk three miles to the station at Paxton.
The railroad depot was moved to the other side of the tracks, but still the same building, I think, it’s now an antique store!
There I waited for three hours until it stopped raining, and set out again at 12:30 o’clock. From there it is just 31 miles to North Platte, and as the sun had come out, I returned to the road. I found it good in places and sandy in spots. There was one stretch, two miles long, so sandy that I had to walk it. It was like being back again in the deserts. I got gasoline at North Platte and pushed on 16 miles to Maxwell, which made 70 miles for the day’s travel.
Maxwell is a little bit of a place, and I had to take accommodation in a room that had three beds in it.
Things are still as slow in Maxwell
I stayed here too, maybe I should have found a room, but instead, I got a lightning show and a night of rain in my tent.
A couple of surveyors were in one of the other beds, and at midnight, a commercial traveler was ushered in and given the third bed. I was fortunate in having a bed to myself at all the small places, for “doubling up” is quite the common thing where accommodations are limited.
One more cyclometer was sacrificed on the ride from Ogallala to Maxwell, snapped off when I had a fall on the road. I do not mention falls, as a rule, as it would make the story one long monotony of falling off and getting on again. Ruts, sand, sticks, stones and mud, all threw me dozens of times.
Somewhere in Emerson I remember a passage about the strenuous soul who is indomitable and “the more falls he gets moves faster on.” I would like to see me try that across the Rockies. I didn’t move faster after my falls. The stones out that way are hard.” The route so far, San Francisco to Maxwell Nebraska
rtwPaul 
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