Another year comes to a close. Thanks for watching my little videos, and for all of your kind words. I hope all of you have a wonderful holiday spent with the people that matter the most to you. Merry Christmas! Chris
Got my daughter a Schwinn Lil Chix(girls Stingray) for Christmas about 30 years ago. She & her younger sister got a lot of miles out of that bike. We kept it in the family for years & eventually passed it along to the granddaughter of one of my riding buddies. Still going strong.
Bikes were always my favorite Christmas present. I remember getting getting a Huffy Red Hot for Christmas one year. That's what all the kid's got who's parents were too poor to buy a Stingray. BTW, I am enjoying the Swift bag I bought from you as my own Christmas present.😊 Hope you had a great Christmas! -Ed
My Christmas bikes - a Columbia Stringray copy and later a Peugeot with the usual cheap plastic Simplex shifting. You nailed that passing of the bike as icon of the big gift replaced by the gaming consol. Schwinn built their mud-century success on marketing to kids wants and dreams. Late in my career I worked with a Schwinn store owner who described the method of selling at Christmas. All gone by the 80s and kind of beyond norms of later consuming habits.
Growing up in the Midwest, we either got our bikes around Easter or at the end of the school year. Your story on the size of the bike you got gave me a chuckle, I see that a lot with the kids around here. Happy Holidays!
Merry Christmas to you and everyone else who shared the life long love of riding. Hope you all have a great one and enjoy some time with your friends and family.
I never got a bike for Christmas but my best friend did. It had hi-rise handlebars and a banana seat. We road that thing all day long…in 30 degree temp. It was wonderful. Merry Christmas. I hope something very good happens to you over the holidays.🎄
Happy Christmas Chris! I’ve got an old Kodachrome slide of 8-yr old me, my younger brother, older sister and older brother standing in the freezing NE Ohio garage, each of us beside our “new” bikes. I say “new” because at that time I thought they were, but looking at the photo I can tell they were second-hand. Mine was I think a Murray boys bike, lime green to dark green fade, slick mag tire on back, 3-speed shifter on the top tube and get this: drop bars! I’m still riding bikes of all sorts and still once in a while acquiring “new” second hand bikes!
My brother and I got red Schwinn Typhoons for Christmas in the early 1960's. It was quite a memorable experience. We have two sisters older than us and I am the youngest. My mom told all of us on Christmas Eve that whoever got the mop and bucket first from the basement on Christmas morning would be allowed to open their presents before breakfast. My brother and I plotted to get up very early around 6:00am and beat our sisters to retrieving the mop and bucket first. Christmas morning came and my brother and I raced to the basement to retrieve the mop and bucket and ran upstairs declaring ourselves the winners. When we got upstairs, my parents and sisters were all waiting by the presents. My mom asked my brother and me if we missed something important in the basement while we were down there. We said "no". My parents and sisters laughed and told us to go check again. So my brother and I went back into the basement and low and behold sitting right next to where the mop and bucket were sitting were our new Schwinn Typhoon bicycles that we simply didn't see during our first mission!
Merry Christmas! I hope the Florida life finds you well. First legit bike I could actually ride was a blue and yellow Team Murray bmx bike. Took it off of many “sweet jumps”😜.
One year, I got a Rampar. Remember those? Raleighs made in Japan - fine bikes, I’m sure. I cannot remember the model. It was gold and eventually got stolen.
