Recreational & Family - Bikes we had as kids.

What bikes did you have as kids? I had a Wildfire that I think came from J.C. penny around 1980 but I'm not sure. My favorite bike was a Western Flyer Baja with the fat whitewall tires. Did anyone have one of these bikes if not what was your favorite.

The one I love and remember was a metallic yellow BayCrest [Hudson's Bay Company brand] high-rise, banana-seat bike that looked a lot like a Schwinn Stingray. It was a single-speed with a coaster brake. I think that was around 1972.

When I was a bit older -- around 1977 -- I got an orange Raleigh Record. That was my first grown-up road bike. I used to ride metric centuries all te time without knowing it -- no speedo/odo.

A Schwinn three speed from the late '50s, handed down to my older brother from someone, handed down to me around '64, '65. It had one of those rear hubs with an oil port. Black frame, heavy, built like a truck.

1st bike was a Schwinn Pixxie, purple even.
2nd was a Schwinn 5 speed Stingray, metalflake green.This bike had a huge chainwheel, too big. Should have been a 38 or so.....
3rd was a 10 speed Vista, metalflake coffee brown. Had a Sun Tour drivetrain that shifted flawlessly.

My first bike was a Huffy Dragster. (Pictured)
My second bike was a Ross BMX bike that was a tank! That bike had to weigh 50Lbs!
After that I had a few 1980’s era BMX racers (PK Ripper, GT) that I raced on till I was old enough to drive.

Tom

My first bike was a hand-me-down from my brother. Don't remember what the brand was, but it was small frame single-speed (with training wheels - red in color with fenders). My Christmas present when I was around 11 years old was a green Schwinn with the Bendix 2-speed rear hub (who remembers those - just backpedal and it shifted up and down between the gears). A few yeas later I then saved my money from a newspaper route and bought a Schwinn Stingray. It was the coolest! Gold mettalic paint, sparkle banana seat, 2-speed Bendix hub, front side pull brake and a rear slick. I loved that bike. Cost $89.00 US.

Graduated to a real bike after being given a chance to buy a Gitane (French) when I was about 15. Cottered crank (heavy), sew-up tires, 10 speeds and center-pull brakes. A lovely yellow-green mettalic. That is what really got me into cycling as an adolescent and I've been riding ever since and I'm now at the half-century mark. Thanks to the woman at the local recreation center that scored the special deal on the Gitane bikes for about 15 of us kids. She sold them at cost just to get us interested in cycling.

I've had plenty of bikes over the years but the above list is my history and I wish I had them all back in my stable now. I'll just cherish the memories I guess.

I can't believe I actually rode this thing, but here is a photo of a bike almost like mine. I had a front caliper brake and the seat had a smooth surface and a metalflake cover. And of course the nifty 2-speed Bendix rear hub.

1) fat-tyred Schwinn
2) Bianchi road bike

(same as now ...)

first bike was a huffy :lol:
then had a gt mtb for a while and recently got my road bike and upgraded my mtb to a specialized..

My first bike was a Hercules with a Sturmey-Archer 3-speed. I bought this bike with money from my paper route. I rode this to school and back until I got to high school. After college, I got an AMF Roadmaster ***. My first real bike was a Fuji Royale and I have been riding road bikes ever since.

i,m going back to the mid ,50s now ,in the UK ,I got a second hand Gresham Flyer, it had a rack on the back that was all part of the frame, it was great for towing each other on our roller skates, the ones you strapped to to your feet & had steel wheels ,does anybody remember those ? they were s/hot in the dark as sparks sprayed out of the wheels ! my next bike was second hand 27" BSA my dad got me, it had 3speed de-raileur simplex gears.:D

My first "real" bike was a bright blue Ross 10 speed in the early 1982. It was an entry level bike, but I got it at a LBS.

I felt like the coolest kid on the block.

Then I started to pay more attention to cars and girls...fell away from bikes for about 19 years!

Of course I never put the kind of miles on the Ross that I do now!

Matt

[list=1]
Late sixties Columbia Playbike --metallic orange, brown banana seat (currently in storage in MN)
Coast King ten speed --originally red but spotted with multi-colored touch-up paint. (currently a set of rusted pipes in a landfill somewhere near Fernadina Beach, FL
[/list=1] Both of these were hand-me-downs but oh the memories of flying through town at 30 mph on 1 1/8 inch tires passing traffic....... ahhhhhh.:D

First was a black Schwinn Bantam I think, probably 16" wheels. Next was a green Sting Ray at 10, then an orange Varsity when I was 14. Those were the bikes my parents bought.

At 15 I welded junk frames and made a side hack. At 16 (1978) I bought a 1963 Schwinn Tandem which I still have. At 16 I also went in halves on building a sidehack which me and my monkey raced for the next couple years. This was a Gray Littlejohn Hack frame bolted to a Mongoose Bike frame

http://www.geocities.com/thespeakerguy/sidehack.html

I guess Maybe I have stayed true to form.. I like road bikes.. My first bike was a 10 speed English Racer stye bike. That was a lot of years ago.. Can't remember the manufacturer.. 10 speed that was pretty impressive. All you would need when you were a kid and in the flat mid-west.. I can recall riding it on the back roads as far as Ann Arbor. That would be about 30 miles round trip..
Don't think I ever told my folks.. Remember when they would ask, what did you do all day... Nothing.. They probably would have thought the roads were too busy for a kid.. Probably, Very early teens.

A Schwinn Pixie - no training wheels! Ah, freedom!

Then in 1963, I got a Schwinn Traveler. It had three whole gears (that lovely Sturmey Archer). It was a pretty deep red color. I sold it to a friend's 25 yr. old daughter about 2 months ago (!!) She's been coveting it since she was about 12 and I finally gave in..

So now I'm down to only4 bikes in the living room.. :D

I can't tell you what kind of bike it was, but it was The Pink Lady. It was pink and had a beautiful flower banana seat. I rode it everywhere until the sixth grade when I got a Schwinn Woodlands. I just replaced that bike this week. :)

A Schwinn Scrambler. It was a red, Canti frame, banana seat, and one of the early prototypes of the bmx handlebars. Ditched the "naner seat" for a early bmx seat and metal mags(yellow). The bike felt like it weighed a ton next to all my friends with the double triangle bmx bikes. But I still beat them, or kept up with them.

All I know is this is making me misty eyed thinking about that first bike, and how my parents through it away the first chance hey had after I got the mtn bike. :(
But I still have the oval head badge from the bike:D

My brother and I first bike was a Ram Rod. Red and yellow with a red banana seat with a big black arrow on it. My father turned it into a BMX bike. Cracked the frame 3 times before we got got brand new Opem Road's. Steel mags, Shimano brakes, the works. The bike weighed a ton. Then I started buying my own bikes. Mongoose, Redline, and GT. Always wanted a Kuwahara(sp?), but they were too much. Now I got my trusty Mantra Race.

Neat thread.

Gosh, it is hard to remember back to the late 40's, but as I remember, we generally had some family bikes that we all sort of rode. Everything was always second-hand or bought used.

The first bike I remember that was MINE was a Hercules 3 spd with Sturmey Archer gears, foot brakes and one hand brake. Later on, I got a 3 spd Schwinn heavy duty Paper Boys bike that must have weighed 40-50 pounds, which I loaded down with about 100 papers and rode up some extremely steep hills fully loaded.

Stingray with a springer front end.

I can't remember the name brands, but I had a few store brand bikes from Western Auto, Sears, and Roses's. My first real road bike was a blue Schwinn Paramount that was stolen from my first house.

My first I dont remember the name of it. The second was a new Huffy 10 speed. Im sure that bike has been in the dump for 25 years by now.

My first real bike was a Sears and Roebucks free spirit ten speed. All others before that one were basically toys.

My favorite bike as a kid.

A 1968 blue Schwinn Stingray. 3 speed stick shift, sissy bar, bananna seat, super fat slick in the back. It was the coolest thing around. I could pull a wheely and ride that sucker for blocks.
Thanks for bringing back the memory.

Back around 1950 or so - a HUFFY CONVERTIBLE. After I graduated to a bigger bike, dad cut the top tube out of it and made a girls bike out of it. My sister then used it and so did her daughter some 20 years after. Still around the house somewhere.
;)
Ron