Living in the Past: A boy and his bicycle

Friday, October 25, 2019

A boy and his bicycle

The 52 Ancestors theme this week is “transportation.”

Transportation comes in many forms, but for a child, they’re limited. For most children, a bike would be the most common form of transportation. It would get you to your friend’s house, to the local store, and even help you earn a little money. My husband remembers using his bike to deliver newspapers. He also remembers having a bike that he customized by extending the front forks that held the wheel on, making the bike look like a chopper. The boy in this picture did something similar but instead of extending it outward, he extended it upward.

Unfortunately, we don’t know who this boy is. This photo is part of the slide collection that once belonged to my husband Charlie’s uncle, Ralph Murphy. Charlie’s aunt, Jean Murphy, gave him the slide collection, which consists of 15 boxes of slides (thousands), in 2012. The photos were taken by Uncle Ralph and span the years 1947 to 1984. Many are scenic shots from their travels across the United States, some are family members, and others friends and co-workers. I converted the majority of the slides to digital several years ago. We’re able to identify many of the people in the photos, but not in this case. Our best guess is that this boy lived in West Virginia, probably Nutter Fort, in the 1960s. If you recognize him, I’d love to hear from you.