Doug Fattic 

I just had a nice phone call with Jim Merz. He was the 1st American to pass the Reynold 753 test. This was given in order to make sure builders could be successful making a frame with this new light heat treated tubing. Many classic era European builders had pretty crude methods that wouldn't work well with this new stuff. Reynolds didn't want the reputation of their new flagship tubing to get damaged by inadequate builders. When I visited Terry Bill at Reynolds in Birmingham in 1977, he told me every American up to that point had failed the test. So Passing the full test that including making an entire frame was kind of a big deal. Later they dumbed it down to just a few stub tubes that needed to be brazed into a bottom bracket shell. No complete frame was checked for alignment accuracy to pass this new test.

Terry Bill's revelation on American builders all failing the test showed that at least in 1977, not everyone was ready for prime time yet. I don't know how many took it or who it was that did take the test. My 75£ check to pay for their test tubes still sits in my desk drawer. At the same time I had gotten a couple of Raleigh 753 frames with cracked chain stays in my shop for repair so I thought I would wait until they solved that issue. About that time Tange came out with its Prestige line (Merz had a hand in that when he worked at Specialized). It was also light heat treated tubing. Eventually I got my 753 certification later by passing the simpler test. I really liked using Prestige so wasn't motivated to send in a test.

Jim got inspired to build frames because of a world bicycle tour he took in 1972. He came from a fabrication and machinist background that instinctively told him how to make frames. He hung our with neighbors that were making their own helicopters. After he made his, requests came from his friends to make one for them too. This was around 1973. Mark DiNucci worked for Strawberry and eventually came to help Merz make frames. And later went on to work at Specialized with Jim. Jim thought Marc started building about the same time he did. Some of those statistics may need to be revealed. Who was it that brought framebuilding knowledge to Strawberry? I don't think it was the owner Andy Newlands.

Another guy that worked at Strawberry was Mike Bornstein. He brought a lot of his machinery from Iowa to Strawberry in Portland. After about a year he went back to Iowa. Eventually he went into machining because it payed much better. Now that he is retired, he is making some frames again. Mike is the one that taught Jeff Bock in Ames, Iowa. Jeff started making frames in 1976. He is the builder I would have make me a frame if I wasn't a builder myself. Like me he is a painter too and teaches a framebuiling class in the winter on the week-ends.

Sacha White I believe took the last class Tim Paterek taught before Tim went into teaching public school full time. I'm going by memory here so those details may need to be revised.