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First and Last Ballooners?

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Is it just me or did everybody just ignore the 1932 Hawthorne ad featuring a bike with balloon tires on it? I always thought it was Schwinn B line bikes too but I guess that's not exactly true - or somebody has an older Schwinn ad featuring 26x2.125s?

Just incase you really didn't notice eazywind's post here is the ad again:

1932pic3JPG-1.jpg


I never knew that - you learn something new every day I guess :)

....and the reference page: http://www.nostalgic.net/bicycle721

Are they clinchers or are they simply wide, low-pressure single tube type tires? The cross-section shown in the ad appears to depict a single-tube type tire. The text is very small, but I did not see it mention that it uses a tube and clincher type design, though I may have missed it. Do they mean balloon as in what we call a "balloon" tire now, or did they have in mind a wide, low-pressure single tube that was like an intermediate type?
 
Are they clinchers or are they simply wide, low-pressure single tube type tires? The cross-section shown in the ad appears to depict a single-tube type tire. The text is very small, but I did not see it mention that it uses a tube and clincher type design, though I may have missed it. Do they mean balloon as in what we call a "balloon" tire now, or did they have in mind a wide, low-pressure single tube that was like an intermediate type?

I think the only difference is clincher v tubular but they are referred to and look like balloon tires. If you look at the text on the right it talks about - hard to read tho I agree. I'm sold on this but I just want confirmation it's a 1932 ad.

Balloon means 26 x 2.125 or so I have been told numerous times in the past, it being a size reference as opposed to anything else, as in 'big and balloony and fat looking' - very cool

I'm more concerned if its really a 1932 ad
 
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Is it just me or did everybody just ignore the 1932 Hawthorne ad featuring a bike with balloon tires on it? I always thought it was Schwinn B line bikes too but I guess that's not exactly true - or somebody has an older Schwinn ad featuring 26x2.125s?

It clearly says on the ad both above the picture and to the right of it that it's the first bike to have such tires. However I can't find a year written on it albeit captioned on nostalgic as being a 1932 ad page. I think it's worth confirming that to be a 1932 page. It wouldn't suprise me if people think it was Schwinn (who 'inventec balloon tires on bikes) regardless because they are the king kong market and ad/business/sales experts. I think they might have taken the idea and ran with it, claiming to own it perhaps. That is how business works in the real world afterall. Often the original idea comes from a quieter entity.

Just incase you really didn't notice eazywind's post here is the ad again:

1932pic3JPG-1.jpg


I never knew that - you learn something new every day I guess :)

....and the reference page: http://www.nostalgic.net/bicycle721


My only question here would be were these singletube balloon tires or tube & tire balloon tires we know today.
 
Ad says

Cement type balloon tires, so single tubes is my interpretation, but I also wonder if the ad is from 1932, but is a reasonable assumption with the bike and accessories.
Chris
 
If you see the tire insert above, that is a singletube balloon....

Exactly - the operative word being balloon - clincher or not, balloon is balloon so assuming it's a 1932 ad it goes without saying that the point has been made as put by Dave Stromberger on the ad page as follows:

"1932 Hawthorne ACE Balloon Tire Motorbike
This ad from a 1932 Montgomery Ward catalog describes this bicycle as having “Balloon Tires”. They appear to be single-tube type tires like the common (at the time) 28″ tires, but they are 26″ and a larger diameter. This of course pre-dates Schwinn’s claim to fame of having the first Balloon Tire bicycle in America."

I don't think it could be much clearer really - whether or not clincher is just semantics but the fact remains that it looks like "balloon" tires were introduced otherwise to our general perception of it being Schwinn. I always thought it was a Schwinn 'B' range beginning, until now anyway :)

....all this asusming it's a 1932 ad. Schwinn had better advertising and that's why we think it was Schwinn - the business world is always like this. Look at Gary Fisher - he was the businessman - not the inventor hands on per se - same with Steve Wonzniak who was the hands on apple creator whereas Steve Jobs was just the business guy. In this case I would say Schwinn has taken the credit simply for the same kind of business reasons but it's starting to look pretty undeniable that it was not actually them who made the practical physical application 'first'. Nothing wrong with that. They obviously knew a good idea when they saw one but it's clearly not right to say they 'invented' it as they claim in their very well designed 1933 ad.

To question all this around the issue of clincher versus tubular is a matter of whether you prefer the idea that it was Schwinn and therefore choose to lay hold on the matter of clincher being somehow the important part of the meaning of 'balloon' but obviously what it is called is 'balloon clincher' so in reality it is possible although not certain that schwinn introduced the 'balloon clincher' - but that is such a load of semantic waffle it seems irrelevant - when it looks like balloon tires that added to the look and changed the nature of the ride came from Hawthorne - probably - and not Schwinn. It's all then a matter of whether you are just biased to Schwinn holding the 'title' in which case you will have to always specifiy - contrary to their 1933 ad claim - that they invented the "balloon clincher" and certainly not the "balloon" tire (which is what matters surely since you can't see inside the tire anyway) otherwise you would be misrepresenting Schwinn.

It couldn't be more obvious. Personally I woiuld like the see proof of it being 1932 - the rest is obvious. If you say "Schwinn invented the use of balloon tires on bikes in 1933" you would not be telling the truth. Its "balloon clincher" for those of you who insist.
'
 
......or

....or is what I just said so obvious I didn't need to say it? I think it might have been.
 
The real thing that is obvious in this thread is the intent of the creator of this forum. That intent refers to balloon clinchers, not the very obscure balloon single tube bike or else the date would have been 1932-1965.

Let's not forget that although Schwinn is credited to be the first to "introduce" the clincher balloon tire to the American bicycling world other companies came out with their own the very same year of 1933 as well. 1933 is simply the first model year for American clincher balloon tire bikes. No big conspiracy here.

We may have to create a new category name "Classic Single Tube Balloon Tire Bicycle 1932-1932".


scan0009.jpg

From the 1933 Columbia catalog

scan0009.jpg
 
The real thing that is obvious in this thread is the intent of the creator of this forum. That intent refers to balloon clinchers, not the very obscure balloon single tube bike or else the date would have been 1932-1965.

Let's not forget that although Schwinn is credited to be the first to "introduce" the clincher balloon tire to the American bicycling world other companies came out with their own the very same year of 1933 as well. 1933 is simply the first model year for American clincher balloon tire bikes. No big conspiracy here.

We may have to create a new category name "Classic Single Tube Balloon Tire Bicycle 1932-1932".


View attachment 99442
From the 1933 Columbia catalog

Exactly, Schwinn may have introduced the balloon clincher in '33 whereas Hawthorne may have introduced the tubular balloon before. So next time somebody asks (not that they would) "who introduced the balloon tire to the bicycle world" the answer is Hawthorne in 1932. Anything else would be false assuming the ad is a '32 ad. I've never heard the question of what kind of balloon tires they are come up. Actually the only conspiracy is that Schwinn wrote on their '33 ad that they were the first to introduce balloon tires when that is technically speaking not true - but it's normal for any company trying to up itself in the game to advertize in this sort of way. It's up to us to take it with a grain of salt. It's not like we should believe everything ads tell us. I don't but I will admit to being duped by Schwinn in this case. They should have just added clincher - it certainly wouldn't have sounded as good but it would have been the truth.

To put it differently - a bike with 26 x 2.125 tires, regardless of how they were put on or what is inside them - is a balloon tire bicycle, or a bicycle with balloon tires on it. I mean one would sound pretty silly saying "no, those aren't balloon tires because they aren't clinchers" assuming one even noticed. I think Mr Columbia is right - balloon single tube tires are obscure balloon tires :)
 
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Company's stretch the truth all the time. It does often come to a matter of semantics. Columbia's tag line has always been "Americas First Bicycle" but strictly speaking that is not true either. They were the first lasting production bicycle in America though and that is what counts.

"The winner gets to write the history!"
 
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