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And now to 1944 and Tyler, Texas. This is from the Tyler Courier-Times newspaper, November 12, 1944.

With World War 2 raging in Europe and the Pacific, automobiles out of production since early 1942, and gasoline rationed, bicycles were very precious for transportation!

Thieves in Tyler, Texas were busy grabbing those precious bicycles! But it seemed those stealing bikes had a particular attraction to (you guessed it) Packard bicycles.

As incredible as it may seem, here are at least three Packard bicycles all stolen around the same time!

From the files of National Bicycle History Archive of America (NBHAA.com) and Leon Dixon.

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Now... lets roll back to 1935 and over to Akron, Ohio. Look what they were selling at the Dollar Stores! And they don't even mention giving you one of these with a Packard automobile. Hmmmmmm...

By the way, this is a coincidence to the present ongoing (and mostly naive) endless debates about Arnold, Schwinn & Company inventing the balloon tire for bicycles.

The ad describes "Goodyear balloon tires" but the image (a rather generic one used in other ads) is a contradiction. It appears to show a boy on a bicycle equipped with 28-inch singletube high-pressure tires.

But hey... where else would you find so much Packard bicycle history? Right here.

Original 1935 ad courtesy of Leon Dixon and National Bicycle History Archive of America (NBHAA.com).

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Now let's go even further back. This time to December of 1926. The location was St. Louis, Missouri. The retailer was Stix, Baer & Fuller.

Neither the advertisement text, nor the image make it clear which manufacturing company made this Packard bicycle.

However we can tell you one thing. This single upper bar frame design (known as a "camelback") was typical of at least one model manufactured by Arnold, Schwinn & Company (ASC) around this time. If you would like to see other examples, scroll back through this thread. An ASC camelback bicycle is shown in red (as indicated in the ad) in the original ASC dealer literature. And again in the PMCC color advertisement that talked about "Red Letter Days."

You will note reference to "nickled rims" in this B&W ad. Chrome didn't start entering the bicycle realm until around 1928, two years after this ad appeared.

Reference to "New Departure" coaster brake shows that by the 1920s coaster brakes were common on American bicycles... and expected equipment (see earlier discussion in this thread about the emergence of bicycle brakes). As for New Departure, it eventually became a division of none other than General Motors.

Also, for those loyal followers of this thread, you will notice that Packard bicycles were indeed sold from one end of the USA to the other. And in both large and small communities. So for those bicycle "experts" today who crow about other brands and can't recall the facts on Packard bicycles... they just can't recall what they just don't know.

Oh. And dare I say it once again for the upteenth time? No mention of giving these bicycles away to "sweeten deals" on Packard automobiles.

Original literature image courtesy of National Bicycle History Archive of America (NBHAA.com).

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And now... let's continue our steps back in time. On this occasion to the 'teens.

I'm going to show you a Bean Son Company 1917 distributor billhead that I may have posted previously in this thread. But then I am going to show you a page from that company's catalogue of around the same time. It shows a Packard bicycle that Bean Son marketed.

This same bicycle was also marketed under the "Excelsior" brand (which seems to get the motorcycle folks all tingling). But this all leads to a very confused, mis-understood and very convoluted "history" of Excelsior bicycles. Folks think these bicycles have some relationship to Excelsior motorcycles (they usually don't) and to Schwinn (again...they really don't).

Recently there has been a bicycle just like this one being shown online... only it says, "Excelsior" on the headbadge... long story. But for your pleasure...

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Regarding Hogg Junior High School, it was no doubt named after Texas Governor Jim Hogg, who was a very remarkable man.

Besides being governor, and among a great many other notable accomplishments, he was a principal founder of The Texas Company, later known as Texaco.

He was also the father of Ima Hogg, a most gracious lady, herself of diverse accomplishment, her peculiar name notwithstanding.

Now to 1940. And for Schwinn fans worshipping down on their knees... we return to the almighty Schwinn-Built prewar Packard bicycles.

Frankly I have forgotten the location and name of the town where this shop was located.

However you can see that they were selling bicycles made by Arnold, Schwinn & Company (ASC). The comma is correct (the ad is wrong)... there was nobody named "Arnold Schwinn" but rather Mr. Arnold and Mr. Scwhinn went into business making bicycles. Thus "Arnold, Schwinn & Co." was the name of their business.

You can also see that this shop was selling both Packard-branded and La Salle branded bicycles that were both Schwinn-Built.

Of course car guys then and now will presume these names had automotive origins. But the bicycle industry purposely kept this a murky connection. For instance, "La Salle" in this case was a name actually used by the W-D of Chicago Cycle Supply Company (location obvious). If one had a Schwinn-Built bicycle with a "La Salle" name on it, this meant it came to the dealer via Chicago Cycle Supply Company– a large W-D that handled ASC products and others.

The name, LaSalle didn't come from the car, but from a downtown district and street. My grandparents who started an insurance company in Chicago used to stay at the huge, grand old LaSalle Hotel downtown Chicago... when downtown was nice. With Chicago Cycle Supply Company (AKA "ChiCyCo") in the downtown business district it was a natural to adopt LaSalle as one of the many bicycle brands offered. For car people, a whole new realm for the term, badge engineering.

ASC bicycles rarely, almost never said merely "Schwinn" on them until after WW2. But instead came with hundreds, perhaps thousands of names on them. This is why the company coined the term, "Schwinn-Built."

In those times in the USA, bicycle shops could choose from an assortment of existing names offered either by the manufacturer or by the wholesale-distributor that served them. Shops and retail stores could also make up their own headbadge design and name for an incredibly low price.

Contrary to popular and mythical belief of today, ASC neither started this method, nor was the only bicycle company using it. MOST American bicycle makers, wholesale-distributors (W-D) used the same process. Ditto for retailers and individual shops. This had zero to do with Schwinn– no matter who says otherwise.

The artwork in this advertisement was standard late 1930s/early 1940s ASC iconery. The boy with a fully decked-out Deluxe Autocycle on the left and the girl with her fully equipped ladies' model appeared in numerous ASC publications, brochures and even a full-sized color prewar poster (we had the huge color poster years ago, but it "disappeared" while being framed at a shop in central California).

By the way, the thick cross-bar attachment on the handlebars of the boy's bicycle was cast aluminum and carried a built-in, illuminated speedometer along with electric horn and headlight button controls (see my 1941 Schwinn Packard Deluxe Autocycle pictured earlier in this thread).

Image courtesy of Leon Dixon and National Bicycle History Archive of America (NBHAA.com).

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Now we showed you a bit about Packard Tires earlier in this thread. These were for bicycles and cars and we bet that Packard fans didn't know about them.

So here from our extensive collection of Western Auto catalogues (and we have hundreds) is an interesting cover featuring what else?

You got it. Packard tires again. Ask and we'll post the year.

Western Auto stores sold Peerless brand bicycles and later, famous Western Flyer bicycles.

While most tires for Western Flyer bicycles were Davis brand, yes, some Peerless and Western Flyer bicycles got Packard tires!

So. It was possible to have Packard tires on your Peerless or Western Flyer OR your Packard bicycle!

And while bicycle people online will swear to you that the 1980s Carlisle bicycle tires with Indian heads on them are somehow"prewar"you know this is absurd. That is... IF you know about Packard Tires and Pharis Rubber Company. Why? How?

Hmmmmm...

Oh... as often in this thread, original literature supplied from the files of National Bicycle History Archive of America (NBHAA.com).

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Someone asked. So... Pharis Tire & Rubber company made Packard Tires, not Western Auto... which merely sold them...