These are the two major swaps/shows that I attend each year. Besides Copake in New York this fall these are the main antique and classic bicycle events in the U.S. each year with people from across the U.S. and occasional overseas travelers attending. Memory Lane is held at the Wood County Fairgrounds in Bowling Green, Ohio and Monroe is held at the Monroe County Fairgrounds in Monroe, MI which is only a 45 minute drive from Bowling Green. The last couple of years seemed to be flat both in attendance and transactions.

This may have been attributed to the economy which has put the squeeze on the average person and really seemed to have hurt the entry and mid level stuff. I still see no problem with top shelf bikes and parts moving as evidenced by the recent sale of an Aerocycle tail light for $4500! Most folks don’t spend that for a whole bike and that kind of money gets you into some pretty nice stuff.

This years events had a renewed sense of excitement and were well attended with a lot of stuff changing hands. At Memory Lane this year Pete Dieterich hosted an auction of about 130 bicycles on Thursday with about an 85% sell through rate. Also, on Friday, the Bicycle Museum of America of New Bremen, Ohio deaccessed some of their bicycles which included an 1890s Wolf American side-by-side among others.

Since these events have been moved a week later in the year the weather has generally been much better. I think we saw 80s on Wednesday and I got a pretty good sunburn. Thursday was nice but Friday brought the liquid sunshine in the morning and by about 1pm things were wrapping up as people loaded to head north to Monroe.

Monroe opens Saturday for vendors but my dad and I use this as our day to do something else. In years past we’ve visited the Battle of Fallen Timbers site, ProTeam Corvettes, The Bicycle Museum of America, and the Museum of the Great Lakes to name a few. This year we did some antiquing and each got a workout in.

Bright and early Sunday morning we left Bowling Green and headed north to Monroe. I usually show a bike at the Monroe show in the Classic Bicycle of the Year and have won a few times. This year I carried my 1949 Schwinn B507 to show. While I didn’t win anything it’s always nice to share things that people might not otherwise see. In the show class this year were a diverse array of bikes to include a beautiful ’41 Schwinn Autocycle Super Deluxe, a Monark 26X, a ’41 Colson Twin Cushioner Imperial, a really nice Robin, an Evinrude, and a G519 military bike along with several others including mine.

A first this year was the winner of the “Best Restored” class with Brant Mackley’s, Jim Henderson patina restored, 1937 Roadmaster. Brant couldn’t be in attendance so Aaron Etheridge accepted on his behalf. The bike looked like it had gently weathered the last 87 years naturally even though it was restored in the past few months. This has been something of a trend the last few years to restore bikes to look unrestored and the level of accuracy is scary! The “Best Preserved” award went to David Gehring and his 1941 Schwinn Autocycle Super Deluxe. Congrats to all the winners.

It seems to me we finally made the ‘COVID turn’ and things are getting back to some normalcy. These shows are great for the hobby but wouldn’t be possible without the hard work of those that put these on. I’d personally like to thank Jerry Herron for the Memory Lane show and Nick Avina and crew for the Monroe show. Until next year just enjoy the ride!