Hi, My name is Michael Swanson. I am the manager at Clark’s Bicycle Center in Hickory, N.C. Clark’s Bicycle Center has been selling bicycles to the greater Catawba County area for over forty years! We have recently been working on getting a website started with the help of Crystal Gustin of Creative Flow of Asheville, N.C. While the site is still under construction, and while we are still in the process of deciding what the site will contain and what type of resource it will be for you, the cyclist, I will be posting several blog articles and updates. I hope that the site will be both entertaining and informative, and maybe even enlighten your bicycling adventure.

What made me love cycling? Why do I want to pass that “passion” to you? I will try to answer those questions and others in this series of blog entries. Bicycles were nothing more to me than alternative methods of travelling around the area by my own means(powered by me). I started riding a bicycle around the age of nine. I started late because in my father’s mind…they could be dangerous around traffic, and to a nine-year-old little boy. I will turn 50 in February of this year, and like most kids in my age group, I loved to watch Captain Kangaroo on Saturday mornings when I was a young boy. I could not wait until the Captain unveiled the new Schwinn bicycles around the spring and the holidays on his Captain Kangaroo Show. I was daydreaming about the “Stingray” or “Peeler” that I would someday (hopefully) own, and be able to pedal around the block where I lived in Conover.

It was not a Schwinn, but a Columbia that I first came to own on my ninth birthday. This particular bike had a three-speed hub, slick tire in the back, sissy bar, was a bright yellow, and had cool graphics to match. It also had chrome fenders, a semi-banana seat (before I knew they were called saddles!). I really don’t remember the time frame that It took me to learn to ride, and I really haven’t given it much thought. I don’t think it took me too long to learn to ride because I can never remember disliking the bicycle since my first encounters.
This is going to tie into my second blog entry about my absolute favorite “cyclist” Roy Hedrick of Conover, N.C. He was truly my first real glimpse at a “true cyclist”. So I hope to bring some understanding of why people love bicycles, and why bicycles are a great thing. So keep tuned to this station, and more than anything else you can do today….enjoy riding a bicycle!