Hey, I grew up in Monticello, NY. My mom taught at the high school, we moved out when I was around 8-9. Lived in beautiful Jeffersonville, next to the cemetary. Good fishing country. My dad used to go hunting up there with my grandfather until he passed away. I imagine that would be good riding up there on the country roads but you are right, in that setting I would wear a helmet, for one since the speed limit is 55mph and you have some big old hills to descend.
On Tue, Oct 2, 2012 at 3:50 PM, Steve Palincsar <palin...@his.com> wrote: > On Tue, 2012-10-02 at 13:46 -0500, Tim McNamara wrote: > > > Bicycling is safe. The general perception of bicycling now is that it > > is a brain injury waiting to happen. I am old enough to well remember > > when that public perception changed: when plastic bike helmets hit > > the market ca. 1975. Bicycling! Magazine led the charge. It's a > > great example of a meme. > > I remember those days well. I remember in 1972 when my wife fainted on > a bike ride, went down and hit her head. I remember driving on Rt 17 in > the Catskills at 120 mph taking her to the hospital, with my daughter in > the back seat, and her asking every few minutes "Are we married? Do we > have a child?" and "Who is that kid in the car?" > > And I remember Dick Burns, an engineer from Rochester NY, visiting us in > Monticello, telling us about the ride he was on when his friend and > mentor crashed when he hit a dog, and how he died in his arms from a > brain injury, and how Dick then designed a bike helmet and tried to > persuade the helmet companies to make it commercially. > > I remember how my wife and I bought hockey helmets after that, and how > at CoNYMA, the very first bike rally I ever attended, 1973, I was riding > with Irv Weisman, technical editor of the League of American Wheelmen > Bulletin, who also was wearing a hockey helmet. We got quite a bit of > ribbing at the start of the ride, but about halfway through the ride we > came upon a crash. A guy went down on gravel, landed on his head and > peeled his scalp right off his skull. Oceans of blood everywhere, > simply shocking. And I remember how after that we got all kinds of > questions about where'd we get those helmets, and what were they. > > Eventually, in early 1975, Dick Burns convinced MSR to make a > modification of their climbing helmet and turn it into a bike helmet. > I recall Dick demonstrating that helmet at a workshop at GEAR 1975 that > I, as workshop chairman, had set up. He brought a bowling pin with him, > put on the helmet, and whacked himself on the head with it. Then he > offered anyone in the workshop the chance to use the bowling pin to > whack themselves over the head with a leather hairnet. > > I remember the skepticism in the Mid-Hudson Bike Club, that I belonged > to at the time, until the strongest, most agile rider in the entire > club, Jack Barnard, who had bought one, crashed on a night commute home > from work. He ran over a downed tree branch that he had mistaken for a > shadow, and the bike pivoted around the front wheel high-wheeler style, > and he came down right on his head. I remember the drawing we made of > the helmet for the club newletter (in those days, hand typed and hand > drawn with a stylus on a mimeograph stencil) of the shattered helmet, > and I remember Jack's comment that he had a headache, but the ER docs > told him were it not for that helmet he would have been a dead man. And > I remember how by the end of the month every member of the Mid-Hudson > Bicycle Club had bought a helmet. > > Yeah, it's all a conspiracy on the part of the helmet makers and > Bicycling magazine, and head injuries just don't happen. And if you're > extra careful, bike crashes don't happen either. > > Bull$hit. > > > > -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "RBW Owners Bunch" group. > To post to this group, send email to rbw-owners-bunch@googlegroups.com. > To unsubscribe from this group, send email to > rbw-owners-bunch+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. > For more options, visit this group at > http://groups.google.com/group/rbw-owners-bunch?hl=en. > > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "RBW Owners Bunch" group. To post to this group, send email to rbw-owners-bunch@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to rbw-owners-bunch+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/rbw-owners-bunch?hl=en.
