[CR]Re: "suicide front changer"

(Example: Events:Cirque du Cyclisme:2007)

From: "Peter Brueggeman" <pbrueggeman@ucsd.edu>
To: <classicrendezvous@bikelist.org>
References: <003001c66957$a0536910$7670ef84@AD.UCSD.EDU> <8C8377B8BCBE5DF-B78-7C7@MBLK-M08.sysops.aol.com>
Date: Wed, 26 Apr 2006 13:07:00 -0700
Subject: [CR]Re: "suicide front changer"

Dale, do you know if the poor blighters use Benelux, Simplex (with aluminum or plastic knob), Huret or some other brand/model of suicide front changer? Now I see the wisdom in Simplex changing to a plastic knob for their lever front changer so that bicyclists can't hurt themselves. I would guess that the Huret lever front changer is ineffective for suicide. I bet the Archer Chimera family used Benelux lever front changers.

Peter ============================================================= Peter Brueggeman pbrueggeman@ucsd.edu San Diego California
> Obviously you folks are not aware of the very sad history of the so
> called "Suicide Levers"?
>
> I am far from an expert, but a Google search might (or might not)
> reveal more details about the Archer Chimera family in South Dakota? I
> will not go into any depth about this grisly situation except to say
> that shortly after WW2, 4 members of this family (Archer and Fred
> having been ardent cyclists) are said to have ended their lives in a
> bizarre pact and to have used these very shift levers to carry out this
> awful act. Urgghh, indeed!
>
> So if and when we USA folks say "Suicide Levers" it is not a term we
> use lightly......
>
> Dale Brown
> Greensboro, NC USA
>
> To expand on Mick Butler's comment "This would have been originally
> fitted with to
> use the American list terms a Simplex suicide front changer Urrgh!"
>
> Urrgh is right. There's nothing suicidal about lever front changers
> and yet one occasionally hears a CR listee use that confusing term. [snip]
> Peter Brueggeman
> pbrueggeman@ucsd.edu
> San Diego California