Just when I’m feeling useless, (Re: Racer ID) something comes along and pulls me back from the brink. The Rudge guess nudged my mind and I went to my badge collection (about three badges) and pulled out my teens-twenties Rugby badge. It is the exact match to the imprint on this frame.
You are not looking at the remains of a transfer but an imprint in wet paint. The rugby badge is a fancy shield with a partial diamond cutout in the center. Floating stencil style in the opening is a Rugby football with the RUGBY name deeply stamped across it.
Above the football the Norvell Shapleigh Hardware Co is listed and below St. Lewis, Mo.
While you now know how the bike was badged this doesn’t really clarify who made the bike for Shapleigh as they used a wide range of suppliers over the years (I have a 35 Westfield built Rugby Streamline with a later badge.)
I’ll send you a picture of the badge when I get a chance to photograph it.
Oh, and I woke up much too early and thought I would put a bit more time into the LL article, I composed a big chunk of info for the middle this week and just need to work that a bit more. Now that I’ve researched two bikes I think I’ll go back to bed. I have to get up at a later version of early to get ready to go document a friends CWC pile today.
I’ll have some LL text to you early this week,