I just had dinner with a client who grew up in the Bakersfield, California area. During dinner I was describing my life as a BMX racer, and he shared with me a story that could very well alter my perception of the origin of bmx in the United States.

According to Bob, about the time he was 9 (1953) he and his brother modified their bikes to be more like motorcycles. The two boys built a track near Bakersfield and held informal races during these times. Bob also mentioned that many other boys from the area participated and they had jumps, water holes, a starting line and a finish line.

Through the story I head of equipment malfunctions, rivalrys, competition, and FUN! Bob is asking his brother this week if he has ANY photos of any sort so that we might document this historic event.

I have always said and believe that BMX had to be springing up in patches all around the world from times way before our documented starts around 1972-1973. I never found out if those Holland photos were legit, but BMX has always been here. The great masters of the art may not have appeared until the early 70's, but the earliest pioneers were certainly there.

Does anyone else have any knowledge of kids riding bikes in a motorcycle style earlier than the 70's? I know Mattell had the Bronco and the Stallion in 1963. My brother had one of those and they were our early roots in Oklahoma. I was giddy at dinner to hear these stories.

Someone had a picture / magazine cover story from Belgium I think? It was from the 50's and had kids on a dirt track with number plates!

It will be interesting to find out. Hopefully you can talk to his brother too and get his stories.

Cash,

Great story and likely true.

My Dad (born 1930) tells stories of riding his bike on dirt lots (North Hollywood), jumping, sliding (1940 style) and in general having fun both alone and with local kids. No racing mind you but the same stuff we all did at one time.

I think boys have been having fun on bikes for as long as bikes have existed.

Regards, Curt

I think you can {kind of} relate to the "board racer" dudes and the real early stadium style and indoor and outdoor bicycle and motorcycle races, both inside gymnasiums and inside arenas and fairgrounds, and quite possibly see the roots system being laid down.

I have an early 40s picture sitting here of my Pops on a small bike that looks very able of dirt riding.
The pictures of him from 10yrs and up are on a beautiful 26inch Schwinn ?Phantom? with tank, saddlebags, and all of the options. Doesn't look like this one would have hit the jumps.

I'll ask him, when I get a chance, if they ever got rowdy in the dirt lot.

here is the link to the topic of bmx in holland in 1956:

http://www.vintagebmx.com/cgi-bin/ultimate...=1;t=025393;p=1

I think its the oldest "bmx style race" photo seen so far here.

Before I moved away from my first home town in 1970 we used to take all of the interlocking rubber mats from the kindergarten side of my elementary school every weekend and build jumps and hills out of them. We had races with probably 20 kids all weekend before we put them back Sunday night. These tracks were on cement with of course perfectly sculpted rubber jumps. Therefor I say that me and my friends at Cave School in Vallejo California invented modern BMX. We didn't have clips but would have taped our shoes to the pedals if we knew how important it was. You're welcome.

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Does anyone else have any knowledge of kids riding bikes in a motorcycle style earlier than the 70's?

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Oh my yes.

We used to strip down our 26" three-speed English Racers to have tear-it-up races hither and yon, sometimes over trails in the nearby woods, and sometimes on a course through a neighborhood, and sometimes a combination of those. This would be early to mid 60s, easy.

It wasn't _too_ formal, more someone saying "Go!" and two people taking off against each other.

Finding a surface where one could powerslide like a flattracker was also quite the thing.

And even before the movie, imitating Evel Knievel was big, fabricating various ramps/jumps to clear various bits of flotsam in imitation of what he was doing on his motorcycle.

But it was all based in what we'd seen or heard about from the motorcycle scene and going out and imitating it.