Bicycle, ski club to celebrate 40th anniversary
The Fox Valley Bicycle and Ski Club will celebrate its 40th anniversary with a dinner and program from 2 to 6 p.m. April 13 at Riverview Banquets, 1111 N. Washington, Batavia.
Prospective members and former members and participants of Fox Valley Bicycle Club (originally St. Charles Bicycle Club) and Aurora Bicycle Club are especially invited to attend.
Tickets are $20. Reservations are due Saturday. Send them to FVBSC 40th Anniversary, P.O. Box 1073, St. Charles, IL 60174.
The club is also interested in photos (regular or digital) or other items from past club events that could be used for display or in preparing the history CD/program, and notes of memories (such as a special ride, memorable person, etc.) that could be included in a club scrapbook.
Items can be brought to a club meeting or enclosed with reservation, send digital format to webmaster@fvbsc or call Patti Johanson at (630) 605-6841 or Jeanne Bereza (847) 742-1294.
Club meetings are open to public and held the second Wednesday of the month at Batavia Public Library 7 to 9 p.m. with a program and brief social time followed by business meeting. Ride locations/speed/distances vary from easy trail rides, country roads, and weekend trips. For details, visit www.fvbsc.org.
The club began in April 1968 as the St. Charles Bicycle Club, and was sponsored for more than a decade by the park district. With a primary focus on bicycling, the schedule included other outdoor activities such as cross-country skiing, hiking and canoeing; hence the club short name/logo for awhile was "Self-Propelled."
The early years of the club had many short, local family rides and added day trips such as riding the Salt Creek Trail to Brookfield Zoo. In 1969, the club held its first overnight trip to the newly developed Elroy-Sparta Trail in Wisconsin, a 30-mile trail through three tunnels on a former railroad bed. Bikes were transported on homemade rooftop racks and inside vans.
In 1969 the club hosted its first invitational Swedish Days Ride, an easy 25-mile ride to enjoy Geneva's Swedish Days parade and attended by 60 cyclists from Chicago area clubs. Now the ride is the club's biggest and best known event, draws 700 to 800 riders, has grown to 25-, 45-, 62-, 75-, 100- and 124-mile routes held on Father's Day and starts by Burlington Central High School. This year's ride will be June 15.
In 1998, Fox Valley combined with neighboring Aurora Bicycle Club, long known for its early season Silver Springs Sixty Ride held the fourth Sunday of April in Yorkville area. The extra manpower continued this invitational for several more years, with the 30th anniversary SSS Ride in 2004. Proceeds provided bicycles for several local police and fire departments including North Aurora's paramedic bikes.
Over the years, the club has advanced from single speed and 3 speed bikes to members learning how to use derailleur systems on new 10-speed bikes and seeing changes over four decades of bicycles and equipment, plus the development of the Fox River Trail and area bikeway system. The club was encouraged in its early years by Schwinn rep. Keith Kingbay and Phyllis Hursthouse Harmon, then magazine editor for national LAW (League of American Wheelmen), now known as League of American Bicyclists. Both were prominent figures in the bicycle boom in the 1970s and development of bicycle clubs in the Chicago area and nationwide. Programs have featured other notable figures such as Lon Haldeman and Susan Notorangelo -- winners of Race Across America, as well as local cyclists who have shared their adventures riding RAGBRAI, Alaska and Europe.
The club donates approximately $10,000 a year to a variety of bicycle related, trail development, and community causes, such as area park districts, Kane County Forest Preserve District, Illinois Prairie Path, Rails to Trails, League of Illinois Bicyclists, bike rodeo/helmets for kids, and specially made hand-operated trikes and therapy-oriented (pedal-operated) trikes for disabled children through the Pioneers "TOT/HOT Trike" program.