This is an interesting topic. I do not question the quality of this builder's work, and I understand that Herse's daughter is glad he bought the name. Still, this is not the original company, and he had no direct contact with Herse -- he was not his student, or the student of his student; there was no continuity. Would the original company, had it been continually operational, have chosen to follow the same path and the same design aesthetics? Would it have developed in the same direction? Had the same vision?

The same question is now raised in the fountain pen industry: It has grown popular for small manufacturers of upscale fountain pens to buy the rights to names of older, famous pen manufacturers (that had not been in business for decades), replicate the aesthetic of these famous manufacturers, and then sell pens under this name, advertising them as classic products with a 100 year heritage.

Regardless of the intentions of the new manufacturers and the quality of their work, my personal view is that without continuity it is "wrong" to resurrect a company in this manner and claim that your work is a continuation of this company's work. The legendary name should have been allowed to rest in peace. Just my opinion of course.

I've seen you express this sentiment several times since you've joined. Threads are like discussions, and once a discussion is started it is quite likely to "take a life of its own;" in fact, that is a marker of a lively discussion.

The thread starter is not the "owner" of the thread, and a first post is nothing more than a starting point - not a strict dictate of what should or shouldn't be discussed. There are no "off topic" replies in this thread.

I understand that, and I express more of a wonderment/bemusement than any sort of desire to dictate terms or claim ownership of the thread. I certainly understand that people could answer anything they want, or not reply to me at all. But it does sometimes feel a bit like asking "Could somebody tell me the price of milk in Store X?" and receiving a reply to the effect of "You should be aware that other shops also sell milk." Yes, the person is free to answer this way. But I am also free to express confusion over such an answer : )

I'd guess that the links to which you've been pointed or supplied with more than answer your query, at least as far as what can be put on a forum in terms of quantity without getting boring (could well be that searching the past threads would yield a trove of info). Basically, there are two lots of leading undisputed experts who know everything there is to know about Herse René and daughter and their production (in fact everything and maybe even a bit more), and those are www reneherse com whom I imagine might find time to answer some specific queries (or maybe not), and last but not in any way least the Jan Heine brigade (please, there is nothing derogatory in that) which is made up mostly of Jan Heine, a very knowledgeable chap as far as Rene Herse bikes go, and his friends/accolytes who are running the Herse revival, or to phrase that better, the making of high quality bikes under the Herse brand. In fact, Mr Heine has a publication you could subscribe to, and were you able to get back numbers, you'd find a that great deal of content relates to Herse.

Another option is a little known search engine named Google which ofers the option of image searching. Keying in Rene Herse mixte gives some good pics, and you can then view them in their original context, and visit the sites or blogs where they are featured.

As to people chiming in with information which is related to the title of the thread but not necesarily the exact info one may be asking for, well, that's the way discussions generally go and evolve, and definitely what makes this forum enjoyable. There is another forum of sorts which no doubt somebody other than I could point you to, and that one does comply quite strictly to the "keep ontopic and in line" modus operandum.

Batman_3000, thanks for the additional info.

Interestingly, typing in "Rene Herse mixte" into that new exciting search engine you mentioned, does not yield photos of the actual bike I was looking for, which is what led me to post this question. The specific bicycle that I had wanted to see photos of was this one (link originally posted by Scooper).

That's the prettiest of the bunch IMHO.

And made in 1947! Unbelievable.