My Big Green Bike

I was 5 ½ (1952) when I got my new bike.  It was the only bike I had until I was 24.  I truly grew into it.  When I first received it, I didn’t know how to ride a bike, had no training wheels and from the seat I couldn’t reach the pedals.  We lived in Linn Grove, Iowa and my dad and mom purchased the bike from the Minneapolis-Moline dealer, Lester Seifert. Dad thinks he paid $35 for it.   Mr. Seifert’s daughter Carolyn got the same bike.  We had no garage so the neighbor, Millie Evans, across the street gave me permission to keep it in her garage.  I rode mostly on the sidewalk never venturing too far from home. 

At the end of 3^rd grade we moved to Alta, Iowa with some paved streets.  As I grew up I explored most of the town on my big green (really chartreuse) bike.  The summer after 5^th grade I came down the path from the park and made the turn, wiping out on the paved street and taking most of the skin off my right leg.  I limped home, pushing my bike, and was cleaned up and bandaged by my mom.  When my dad got home and saw me he asked, “How’s the bike?”

 I loved that my bike had a light and a button horn (built-in not add-ons)….although keeping fresh batteries was problematic.  It also had a place to sit on the rear fender.  I rode my little sister there and one time her foot got caught in the spokes.  The kickstand was always loose…so in the garage it leaned on the wall or I laid it in the yard.  At one time I had big red Standard Oil valve caps on the tires.  I tried the usual…adding a card to the spokes and streamers.   It was decorated for a parade in Alta to campaign for a swimming pool.  At one time it had a front basket. 

When I left home and my parents moved to Storm Lake, my big green bike took up residence in a chicken coop until I moved to Storm Lake.  I brought it to our home, cleaned it up, put new tires on it and moved it into our sun porch.  While there it wore a wicker basket.  Sometimes the basket held a stuffed animal or the bike was decorated with Christmas lights.

Colleen Samuelson Last

September 28,2010