by The Lost Cyclist: The Epic Tale of an American Adventurer;His Mysterious Disappearance
Finally, Li-Hung-Chang began to rise slowly from his chair, prompting his servants to grasp him by the elbows and help him to his feet. The cyclists breathed a muted sigh of relief before cheerfully thanking the viceroy for the great honor he had bestowed upon them. He replied, with a gentle smile, that he had merely performed his duty. "Scholars," he declared, "must receive scholars." Walking slowly but deliberately, he led his guests back to the main entrance. He gave both wheelmen another vigorous handshake before gracefully bowing out.
Later that day Allen and Sachtleben sailed to Shanghai. There they spent the next few weeks hobnobbing with foreign dignitaries. At one point they heard that another globe girdler would soon arrive from San Francisco to begin his own trip across China, traveling in the opposite direction. His name was Frank Lenz, and he hailed from Pittsburgh. Hoping to meet him, the two young men dawdled a few weeks longer. But when Lenz failed to turn up on schedule, they reluctantly decided that they could wait no longer. On December 6, 1892, they boarded the Empress of China, a six-thousand-ton steamer owned by the Canadian Pacific Railway, for a two-week voyage to Vancouver, British Columbia.
Indeed, after two and a half years abroad, the young men were anxious to return to their homeland. In their haste, they even abandoned plans to tour Japan, satisfying themselves instead with brief port calls to Nagasaki, Kobe, and Osaka. As they pulled out to sea for the long haul across the Pacific, a deep sense of satisfaction and serenity pervaded their hearts. They were returning home with their heads high, well poised to reap the just rewards of their arduous adventure.
5. SHANGHAI, CHINA
December 15, 1892
JOHN O'SHEA, an Irish reporter with the Celestial Empire, an English-language daily, finally got the tip he had been awaiting all week long. The "other" round-the-world cyclist, Frank Lenz of Pittsburgh, had just registered at the Astor House. Only twelve days earlier, Allen and Sachtleben, his famous predecessors, had checked out of that very same hotel in the heart of the Bund, the city's vibrant foreign quarters.
Entering the posh lobby, O'Shea had little trouble spotting his subject, whom he described as "a pleasant faced, boyish looking fellow." Lenz beamed as the journalist approached. "I suppose you came to hear about my trip?" the cyclist inquired with a sly smile. When O'Shea confirmed the obvious, Lenz replied most hospitably: "Well, come right up to my room and I will tell you all you want to know."
After the two settled in Lenz's spacious quarters, the cyclist described his first six months on the road. During the first five, devoted to crossing North America, he had registered five thousand miles—the longest transcontinental ride on record. Over the past month, he had toured Japan, where he logged another one thousand miles. He was thus well on pace to cover twenty thousand miles within twenty-four months. "My pocket-book here has notes about every place I visited and every hotel I stayed at," Lenz explained, "as well as accounts of numerous little incidents."
O'Shea was doubly impressed—this chap was evidently as thorough as he was athletic. As the journalist leafed through Lenz's diary, the cyclist cautioned that while these "minute details" had been "of great interest to me at the time, enlivening my lonely way," they were "very similar to the experiences of other wheelmen who have covered the same ground." Added Lenz, almost apologetically, "So far I have met with only ordinary tribulations. But I look to China to provide me with something thrilling."
The journalist shot a quick glance at Lenz, unsure if his subject was jesting. "I expect it will oblige," O'Shea remarked at last. "And exactly how do you plan to cross China, Mr. Lenz?" Without hesitation, the cyclist replied: "I propose to leave here next week and, by the advice of the gentlemen in charge of the Chinese Telegraph department here, to follow the telegraph line along the Yangtse river, right up to Bhamo, in Burma, on the headwaters of the Irrawaddy. Along those banks I mean to proceed to Mandalay, thence through the mountain passes to Aracan. From there I intend to skirt the coast to Calcutta. The rest of the journey will be comparatively easy."
No doubt it would be, O'Shea thought to himself—should Lenz make it out of China alive. The mere thought of this sympathetic but naive young man heading off alone on his bicycle into the hostile heart of China, in the dead of winter no less, sent chills down O'Shea's spine. Only recently, in the summer of 1891, a wave of antiforeigner riots had broken out in that very valley, quickly spreading across the country. Hundreds of Chinese Christians were massacred, and dozens of stations were set on fire or looted. In Wusuch, an unruly mob killed an English customs official and a Methodist missionary. Nor was the hostility confined to the rabble. As one American journalist had recently remarked: "An intense dislike to foreigners prevails among China's literary and official classes. They look upon us as savages and boors."
Suppressing the urge to lecture Lenz, O'Shea calmly asked the wheelman to sketch out the balance of his global itinerary. Lenz explained that upon reaching Calcutta he intended to cross India, Persia, and Turkey without ever leaving terra firma—an unheard-of feat. Sometime in late 1893 or early 1894, he would enter Europe for the final leg of his tour, then take a steamer back to New York.
Later that afternoon, O'Shea headed to the office to write up his story. He could not suppress his anxiety for the wheelman's well-being, declaring: "We fear that Mr. Lenz, plucky and determined though he is, has a very slight acquaintance with the difficulties of overland travel in China. We do not see how he is going to accomplish the great journey he has mapped out for himself, through the most hostile provinces of the interior."
Clearly, Lenz was heading for trouble—and relishing his growing notoriety. The next day he cycled over to the offices of the North China Daily News, the city's other English-language daily. The startled editor gloated: "It is not often that a subject so openly enters the net of the interviewer." The resulting article, entitled "Another Bicyclist in China," outlined Lenz's audacious plans for "a holiday likely to afford a little adventure." It concluded: "If determination can surmount obstacles, Mr. Lenz seems well equipped for the undertaking."
Lenz's supreme self-confidence was not entirely unjustified, for he was holding up remarkably well. His weight had barely fluctuated, and his health was excellent. Only once or twice had he fallen ill, and only for brief spells. His machine was also working admirably, including the pneumatic tires. He had suffered only a handful of flats, despite the abysmal state of American roads. And contrary to his modest assertions, he had already overcome an impressive array of hardships and close calls.
Admittedly, he had done "the easiest part first." His first leg, a ride up the lush Hudson Valley to Albany, was little more than a carefree romp punctuated by brief visits to Washington Irving's Sleepy Hollow and Vassar College in Poughkeepsie, though regrettably he had resisted the temptation to tarry with the "girls." Whenever the roads became intolerably muddy and a railroad passed nearby, Lenz regained the hard cinder path within the tracks, keeping a constant lookout for broken bottles and approaching trains. "It's dangerous and I don't like to do it," Lenz maintained, though he would continue the practice throughout his transcontinental journey.
At Albany, Lenz turned his wheel west to follow the Erie Canal, alternating between the towpath and the turnpike. He crossed the scenic Mohawk Valley and then rode past thriving farmlands to Ilion, home of the famous Remington typewriters and bicycles. He reached Syracuse just in time to lead a parade. He paused in Rochester, home of the celebrated Kodak and the Rochester Optical Company, makers of his own camera. In bicycle-mad Buffalo, he spent a full three days, basking in the limelight.
Lenz soon found himself in Canada, gazing at the thundering Niagara Falls. An alert but insensitive customs official spoiled the majesty of the moment by demanding a 30 percent duty on the wheel. Lenz, flustered and indignant, produced his letter from the American secretary of state. The official looked it over and apologized for the intrusion. Lenz was allowed to proceed into Ontario without further molestation.
During his week in the
Queen's Dominion, Lenz weathered oppressive heat, frequent rain showers, and his first dog attack. He sailed by endless fields of strawberries and grain as well as large flocks of grazing sheep, frequently enjoying the spontaneous company of other wheelmen. In Hamilton, Toronto, and London, he met scores of Canadian cyclists, including prominent pioneers from the early days of high-wheeling.
At Windsor, Lenz took a ferry to Detroit, site of the most recent LAW national meet and "one of the largest manufacturing cities in the United States." Indeed, a generation later the Ford plant in Highland Park would pump out scores of Model Ts after adopting mass-production techniques already under development by the thriving bicycle industry.
Lenz headed to Ann Arbor, home of the University of Michigan, the largest campus in the country with an enrollment of three thousand students. At Jackson, he was again feted by the local wheelmen, and his bicycle was put on display in a store window. On July 4, Lenz left South Bend, Indiana, at five in the morning so as to reach Chicago in time to celebrate the national holiday.
To avoid the flooded roads, Lenz again rolled between the railroad tracks. Entering Illinois, he passed by the enormous Pullman plant, maker of the world's finest sleeper cars. Just ahead were the looming structures of the upcoming Columbian Exposition, the world's fair in Chicago. Lenz correctly predicted that it would "eclipse any exposition ever held." Little did he know, however, that it would owe much of its future success to a fellow Pittsburgher. George Ferris in fact had just proposed a massive, upright wheel calculated to whip screaming passengers through the air. Ferris had been inspired by an earlier invention dear to Lenz's heart: the high-wheel bicycle.
That evening Lenz cut through Chicago's flowery Washington Park to Michigan Avenue. He reached the Grand Pacific Hotel covered in mud but satisfied with his progress. After one month on the road, he had registered his first thousand miles, averaging nearly sixty miles every riding day. He dawdled for a few days in the big city, touring bicycle clubhouses and catching up with correspondence. With the help of Robert Bruce, his shadowy escort, Lenz wrote his first reports and developed his first batch of photographs.
Although Lenz left Chicago with a hearty band of escorts, one man stood out: William A. Amory, a mute. Observed Lenz: "He was rather quiet company, riding side by side with me for mile after mile without saying a word. But sometimes we would rest by the roadside, and he would bring forth pen and paper and we would hold written conversation." To Lenz's great surprise, Amory pulled to a halt just after the Wisconsin line. He somehow managed to utter an intelligible word: "Dead!" Lenz immediately understood that his buddy was spent and ready to turn back.
Lenz stopped at a malted milk factory in Racine and pronounced the product "the most invigorating and refreshing drink I have ever tasted." James Horlick, the inventor, promised to "forward the gentleman quantities during his trip around the globe." Although the English-born pharmacist failed to keep that promise, he was soon supplying his calorie-laden, nonperishable drink to other famous adventurers, notably Arctic explorers. At Milwaukee, the capital of beer, and Madison, the charming capital city, Lenz was again the center of attention. Passing through Baraboo, the winter home of the Ringling Brothers circus, Lenz took in bewitching Devil's Lake.
But his budding affection for Wisconsin soon waned. While crossing a railroad bridge spanning a steep ravine, an express train suddenly lurched around the bend. Instead of beating a hasty retreat, Lenz suspended himself and his vehicle off one side of the trestle. With one hand he clung to the underside of a tie, and with the other he dangled his bicycle by its front wheel. The train promptly flew by within two feet of his upper hand, while the bridge "trembled and groaned." A few days later, he found himself trudging and cursing along the impossibly mucky road to Lacrosse.
At last, he came to the Mississippi. Passing over six or seven bridges connecting a string of islands, he entered Minnesota. At Winona, he observed a great lumber center. Heading toward St. Paul in poor weather, Lenz stuck to the railroad beds. "I bumped along rather jubilantly," he reported. Workmen and farmers interrupted their chores to marvel at his remarkable ability to ride the ties. Passing through Merrimac Island, Lenz reached the capital city, where some fifty wheelmen promptly treated him to a theater party and banquet. A few days later, at historic Fort Snelling, Lenz bade a hasty goodbye to Bruce, who was unexpectedly called away on personal business.
Lenz lingered a few days in Minneapolis, cavorting with local wheelmen. One, Thomas Bird, escorted the tourist out of town and stayed with him for a few days, insisting on carrying his camera case. After a quick sail around Lake Minnetonka, a fashionable resort, the pair headed west. They passed through small prairie towns populated mostly by Scandinavian immigrants. One evening Lenz admired, for the first time, the northern lights.
Meanwhile, newspaper reporters along the route scrambled to intercept the roving king of the wheel. In Granite Falls, one fortunate journalist got to spend two hours with Lenz, whom he pronounced "the greatest adventurer in his line of this century." The writer concluded his article with a heartfelt "Good luck to you, Frank." A journalist in Montevideo, however, took a dimmer view of the cyclist, remarking, perhaps with literal intent, "In our estimation he has more sand than sense."
Passing alone into South Dakota, Lenz spotted tepees for the first time. Enjoying smooth roads and a cool breeze, he sailed on to Aberdeen, the largest city on his route since Minneapolis. It boasted eighty wheelmen and twenty lady riders. When Lenz arrived at the Sherman Hotel, he found a large crowd awaiting him, including a reporter who judged Lenz "full of life and fun." After a bath and dinner, the obliging cyclist "cheerfully showed the local wheelmen his outfit, answering a multitude of questions."
Lenz decided to wheel north along the James River to Jamestown, North Dakota, where he turned west to follow the Northern Pacific line. A reporter in Bismarck described the cyclist's dramatic arrival:
He came into the city amid a cloud of dust, and at a surprising rate of speed. To the casual observer his outfit was a queer one. Valises galore were strapped all over the wheel. He finally rode up to the Sheridan and took his wheel inside, removing his baggage. He registered as "F. G. Lenz, World's Tour Awheel" and immediately it was known that he was the young fellow employed by Outing. A crowd soon gathered to inspect his wheel and baggage, casting furtive glances at Lenz himself, who stood removing the stains of travel from his face.
The next morning, however, the alert reporter noticed that Lenz was "not by any means well." The journalist theorized that the cyclist was "unused to the water from the muddy Missouri." Lenz nevertheless made good use of his extended stay. Receiving a new tire and chain by the morning express, he spent most of the day repairing his wheel. The cyclist's unflagging spirits deeply impressed the reporter. "Lenz seemed not one whit discouraged, saying he will make the trip with flying colors."
Heading west into the Badlands, Lenz met a host of colorful and sympathetic characters. A cowboy presented him with a hunting knife, while an Indian gave him a drinking horn. The crewmen aboard passing trains repeatedly implored him "to get on and ride a stretch," though he refused to do so. Near the Montana line, he met the Eaton brothers, former Pittsburghers who operated the Custer Trail Ranch, so named because General George A. Custer had camped nearby on his way to his Last Stand. While staying at their lodge, which was popular with eastern tourists, Lenz was surprised and elated when in marched three of his buddies from back home, clad as cowboys.
Passing into Montana in mid-August, Lenz regained the prairie but suffered from stifling heat as temperatures soared to over 100 degrees Fahrenheit. Reaching Miles City, he was struck by its evident prosperity. Although it had recently lost its lucrative buffalo trade with the virtual extinction of that once-ubiquitous beast, the city had risen "phoenix-like" thanks to its imported livestock. In fact, it was fast becoming "the greatest cattle center in the world."
Faced with the need to cross the Yellowstone River, Lenz engineered yet another
brush with disaster. Spotting an abandoned skiff on the opposite bank, he decided to swim over to it so that he could return with the means to transport his goods to the other side of the Yellowstone. "I didn't know anything about that river," Lenz later confessed. "If I had, I would have left it alone. The minute I struck the water I was swept down with the current like a leaf, and it was about all I could do to get out."
The western wilderness imposed many more challenges. Stray needles from cactuses proved as "stiff as steel" and flatted both tires before Lenz appreciated the need for vigilance. Many times he found himself parched with no water in sight. Once he was immobilized for an entire day after drinking contaminated water. He blamed himself for not having purified it beforehand with his ginger tablets. Several times he carelessly fell off steep hills, narrowly escaping serious injury. In Yellowstone Park, a pristine land "snatched from the hand of the Creator," he camped under a rock for a day and a half while a snowstorm raged.
Still, the going was smoother than Lenz had expected. "Back East they had tried to frighten the young rider with stories of the wild and wooly West," a San Francisco paper recounted. "They said that Indians would wear his scalp and cowboys would make him dance at the muzzle of a gun." But as Lenz would later confess: "I had no trouble with anything except dogs." He passed by many reservations and met plenty of Indians, but they were "civil enough." Seeking only to "handle his wheel," they generally concluded: "Good horse, no eat!" He saw many cowboys too, but they wanted nothing more than to ride beside him and chat—until their horses tired of the chase. "The fact is," Lenz concluded, "people are all alike in this country. And if a man minds his own business he won't get into trouble."
Reaching Bozeman, at the foot of pine-forested mountains, Lenz found a "picture of Western enterprise." Its electric lights, among other telltale signs of progress, proved that "the westward march of the empire has already passed this point." And of course, with prosperity came vice. "As is customary in all far Western towns," Lenz observed, "the saloon and gambling dive can be found without the assistance of a detective. And while I neither drink nor play, I saw some folks who evidently do plenty of both."