SlimAgainSoon

When I was a kid, my mother gave a Sears knockoff of the Schwinn Stingray. This was around 1966-69, I can't recall exactly.

That bike — I think Sears called it the Spyder — was a beast. Yes, it looked great — maybe better than the Stingray. But it was heavy, even for its time, and the gearing was ridiculously high.

This was a bike slapped together by the marketing guys, I guess. Clearly, no one put their son or daughter on it, as you had to mash to get it rolling.

Nevertheless, I rode that bike with pride for a number of years.

Eventually, I did a trade with a friend down the street. His mom had given him a bike that looked a bit dorky. It had smaller ape-hanger bars and banana seat, but it had full fenders — what the??? Not the short fenders with the little flare in the back that was part of the Stingray appeal. Kids notice these things.

My buddy eventually took the fenders off, which lifted the not-cool stigma.

I like his bike because it was slightly more compact and far, far lighter than the Sears Spyder. And, most of all, the gearing was low.

You had to spin to do some speed on this bike, but I didn't mind. It was light and nimble and a blast to ride. Made my Spyder feel like a pickup truck.

So, we traded (why he wanted my bike, I don't know). My mother was not happy that I had given up my gorgeous Sears bike for this stripped down (and, by now, repainted) bicycle, but she didn't push it. Good for Mom!

Rode that bike all over, and enjoyed every mile.

So, the question is, what kind of bike was it?

I remember the name Fox on the bike somewhere, and, for some reason, I thought the bike was British.

I recall that it had what I now know were cottered cranks — so exotic! — rather than the Ashtabula cranks that were seemingly universal on every bike in the land at that time. The only time I had seen cottered cranks before were on some English racers that my older sisters had when they were young.

Does anyone remember a Fox bicycle from the late '60s?