PHOTO: COURTESY OF THE NATIONAL ARCHIVES AND RECORDS ADMINISTRATION
men, including five
men from the earlier test rides. The group was rounded out by Dr. James M. Ken- nedy, the assistant post surgeon, and re- porter Edward Boos and was divided into two
squads, which
were headed by LCPL William Haynes and LCPL Abram Martin. The new Spalding bicycles arrived at Fort Missoula from the factory on June 4, 1897, and early in the morning ten days later, with a small group of citizens cheer- ing them on, the Twenty-Fifth Infantry Bicycle Corps rode out of Fort Missoula on its epic 1,900-mile ride. Each rider carried an average of sixty pounds of equipment, includ- ing a tent, clothing, a blanket, rations, a ten- pound Krag-Jorgen- sen rifle, and fifty
rounds of ammunition. The men had to be physically fit to carry this load, and since rations and water were in short supply and supplemental food was only available at nineteen stations placed at one hundred–mile intervals,
u Reporter Edward Boos accompanied the Twenty-Fifth Infantry Bicycle Corps on its epic 1,900-mile ride from Missoula, Montana, to St. Louis, Missouri, and filed exciting news reports along the way.
and the addition of special seats called Christy “anatomical saddles.”
An Epic Journey
To test the new bicycles, Moss planned the Twenty-Fifth Infantry Bicycle Corps’ most arduous ride yet— a 1,900-mile journey from Fort Missoula to St. Louis, Missouri, during which the corps would experi- ence a variety of difficult conditions, including intense heat and cold, violent rainstorms, changes in altitude, and rough terrain. Forty men answered Moss’ call for volunteers, and from this pool he selected twenty
T H E E L K S M A G A Z I N E
PHOTO: ©CYNTHIA HART DESIGNER/CORBIS
u This 1897 Spalding bicycle catalog cover depicts two of the company’s commercial bicycles. For the Twenty-Fifth Infantry Bi- cycle Corps’ 1,900-mile ride from Montana to Missouri, however, the A. G. Spalding Com- pany built specially prepared bicycles suit- able for the army’s purposes.
u This map of Montana, Wyoming, South Dakota, Nebraska, Kansas, and Missouri depicts the route the Twenty-Fifth Infantry Bicycle Corps took during its 1,900-mile ride from Montana to Missouri. PHOTO: LEWIS AGRELL
39
PHOTO: 78.0162, EDWARD H. BOOS PHOTOGRAPHS; MSS 346, ARCHIVES & SPECIAL COLLECTIONS, MANSFIELD LIBRARY, THE UNIVERSITY OF MONTANA.
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