The Six Day Bike Rider (In Progress)
Personal ProjectI first began researching into my grandfather’s past as a cyclist in six-day bicycle races—the forgotten Jazz Age sport—after stumbling upon a blog post that mentioned his name in a story about a brawl breaking out during a race. I never got the chance to meet my grandfather, but grew up on stories about how he loved cycling, along with hints that he’d once had an amateur career in the sport. The image of my grandfather, a small Armenian man, throwing punches in the middle of a race track stuck with me, sparking a long-term search into a part of my grandfather’s past he had kept mostly hidden, even from his family.
After years of collecting personal photographs, newspaper clippings, race statistics from nearly a century ago, and any other information I could find about this forgotten sport, I gathered all my findings into a small paperback book so these pieces of history could exist in physical form.
My hope is to continue this project by expanding both the book and my research on the six-day bicycle racing scene in early 20th century Los Angeles, and exploring the role my grandfather played in it.
Check out the project’s Instagram page!