On a rather beautiful Sunday in October I was in Herentals, Belgium for a vintage bike meeting, and I stumbled upon a Mann-Libertas. Both Mann and Libertas are famous names (in my reality anyway ).

Mann
Mann, or rather Doctor Mann, was the fictitious inventor of the "Wondrous Mann Powders" that would cure just about anything, from a simple headache or flu to mental disorders or an unhappy family life in general.



They would make you as happy as a bird:



The recipe was invented by the Antwerp apothecary Maurice Gemoets, and marketed very successfully in the fifties and sixties. Part of the Mann marketing approach was the sponsorship of a professional cycling team. They were active from the late fifties to the early seventies and big guns such as Briek Schotte and Herman Van Springel rode for Mann:



Libertas
The brand was started by Jules Spagnaerts in Niel, Belgium, in 1919. He was sponsoring riders as early as 1931 and from the late forties to the mid eighties Libertas was a regular in the pro peloton. Most famous riders in their ranks were Stan Ockers (world champion in 1955) and Rik Van Looy, the emperor of Herentals, and world champion in 1960 and 1961:



Mann and Libertas
They did a couple of spells together, and this combination is probably best-known from the Mann-Grundig period (1968-1970). They looked good, with their golden bikes and yellow shirts:




Back to the bike on that Sunday in October. It was my size, the price was reasonable and the seller a nice man, so the bike ended up in the back of my trusted WJ a couple of hours later. When I got it home it looked like this:



It is from 1970 and not a particularly high end frame. It had seen better days, the fork had been replaced at some point in time, the last mechanic that had worked on it had obviously thought zip ties far superior to braze-ons and the eclectic mix of parts parts ranged from rather exquisite Zeus shifters and the pretty TA Professional cranks to a cheap Shimano Tourney rear derailleur and matte black Saccon brakes.

It took me a while to decide what to do with it, and I ended up spending most of December rebuilding it as a rider, while trying to retain the charm that made me buy it. I didn't dare use the old butchered saddle it came with, so I replaced that with a well-used Brooks. Brakes are the ubiquitous MAFAC "RACER"s and the transmission is taken care of by Huret Allvit. The first test rides were a nice surprise. It feels quite nimble and much lighter than it actually is: 11.6 kg as pictured.



BTW, there's nice Mann-Libertas on this forum that actually has the correct team colors. It's owned by fellow member [MENTION=304507]Munny[/MENTION] and can be seen here, but is best sampled on this forum.