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What was your first vintage bike? The one that started it all?

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lgrinnings

I live for the CABE
Apologies if there's another thread with this theme (I couldn't find one), but I came across a photo today of my first vintage bicycle find. It was 1982 and I was 13 years old. I dragged a ladies Firestone middleweight home from the town dump because I loved the atomic age styling (primarily the tank/headlight combination). It didn't matter to me that it was a girl's bike. And while I raced BMX and rode my Mongoose most places, I still took this slightly crusty old lady for frequent rides around town. I even submitted a drawing of this bike with my application to the Carnegie Mellon School of Fine Arts. You never forget your first.

That's my story, but please share yours, so that we may all enjoy. Thanks!

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My first antique bicycle was a 1900 Tribune Model 56 Chainless made in my native Erie PA. My father found it at a local antique shop around 1983 while I was away at college. He always had classic cars, hot rods and motorcycles but I soon realized that it would be a long time before I would have the money or space to have any of my own so decided antique bicycles would be an interesting alternative hobby. Still at it almost 40 years later.
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A friend of mine was into vintage bikes and came to visit me in Northwest North Dakota. He talked me into going out to look for old bikes. We drove across the border into eastern Montana. I saw an old bike leaning against a shed. We stopped and went to check it out - it was a bare bones 60's, but while we were looking at it an old man came out of the house and asked what we were doing. He told us he had a bike with a big tank at his other place. We put him in the truck (I had to ride in the box) and we ended up with a Hiawatha Arrow. I was hooked.
 
In early 2008 I was searching for some small interior parts for my 58 and this 58 showed up in my search. Missed the end of the auction and then messaged the seller letting him know that I wanted to buy it. He relisted it with a BIN price that I said I would be willing to pay and I grabbed it! This is my first vintage bike and the beginning of all this fun.
A two speed manual and a 4 speed manual.

1958 Corvettes



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1970's Schwinn Heavy-Duti during the early 90's. Dumped a ton of money on 95 repop Phantom parts into it. Powder coated the frame and made multiple mail orders from Memory Lane Classics (pre internet). And that was the price of education. Still a Schwinn guy.
 
Mine was a 1949 Schwinn B4 that i paid $200 for. I then had the bike repainted, rechromed the wheels, bars and truss rods, bought repop grips and a saddle and new repop tires from ML. I rode the bike for a few months and caught the bug wanting more and better. I ended up selling the bike for less than half of what i had in it, and chalked the expense up to "tuition for the hobby".
 
I think it was this 1911 Steyer Waffenrad....I found it on Craigslist and only an hour away.....I could not believe that there were bicycles that were over 100 year's old......and that you could ride them......what a noob!
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Or maybe it was this '34 Ingo Bike.....I smoke a-lot of weed so things are fuzzy sometimes....
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I seem to be stuck around 30 bicycles in my collection, sometimes more and sometimes less.....I am about to sell a 13' Big Ball Bowler and a Pinball Machine so I am looking forward to the additional room in my warehouse garage and adding a few more bikes to the collection....
 
Being a life-long resident of Fitchburg, MA, I was always interested in collecting Fitchburg memorabilia, and after both my wife and I retired, we opened a small art gallery on Main Street where I carved out a decent size area to display my finds. I have always had an interest in bicycles, and was well aware that the Iver johnson Arms and Cycle Works was once a major force in our city. Each year I attended the "Longsjo Bike Race" on Main Street that had quite a long history in town, and somehow the thought of owning "just one" Iver Johnson bike that we could display in our window during the annual bike race began to gather momentum and a search began. I was lucky (I think) to make contact with a collector in CA that had this TOC Lovell Special and made arrangements to purchase it. After displaying it for several seasons in our window and having the opportunity to study it closely over the years, the thought of looking for "just one more" began to materialize. The collector frenzy snuck up on me slowly, but it got me, the rest is history. Pete in Fitchburg

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