We are an authorized, direct-from-the-publisher retailer of NEW books. Our titles are ON HAND and available for immediate shipping. Table of Contents Today's cyclists might well be astonished to learn that cyclists of an earlier age had to spend a great deal of time preparing an oil or acetylene gas-powered lamp before they could embark on an evening ride, not to mention the task of cleaning the lamp afterwards. Yet this was exactly what our forebears had to contend with from the time of the popular acceptance of the high bicycle in the mid-1870s to the early years of World War Two, when acetylene gas-powered bicycle lamps were still in use in the occupied Channel Islands. This book describes and illustrates a wide variety of bicycle and tricycle lamps of the past, as well as relating the fascinating stories of their designers and manufacturers, including many examples of the venom with which they often treated each other. This wide-ranging volume also covers subjects as varied as: - The invention of the hub lamp
- The ascendancy of English manufacturers
- The arrival of commercial acetylene gas
- German domination of the European market
- Delayed introduction of electricity-powered lamps
- Fanciful American designs
- The peculiar French market
- Export throughout the world
- The designers and their imitators
- Types of burning oil used
- Inadequacies of candle-powered lamps
- Commercial venom and protectionism
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