Sunday History Column features the Sroat & Wilson Salem Cyclery

It was nice to wake up to see some bike history in the paper today.

Salem Cyclery in the Sunday Paper

We've written about Otto J. Wilson many times (Paul Sroat has been more elusive) and in more detail - with more pictures! - than is possible for a brief history column. If you'd like more see here:

• After the partnership of Sroat & Wilson dissolved, and Wilson sold bikes on his own for a little while, he had very significant Buick dealership where Santiam Bikes is now. "Santiam Bicycle's Building in Transportation History: The Story of Otto J. Wilson" and "With Marion Car Park's Demolition, let's Revisit Otto J. Wilson's Garage." Here is more also on the cluster of car dealerships at the intersection, "Soil Contamination and Monitoring Wells Point to History of UGM Site."
• As the piece mentions, Otto J. Wilson was in the orbit of Myra Albert Wiggins, attended her wedding, and her husband, Fred, sold bikes for a while. "Myra Albert Wiggins Shoots Home and Flood in 1890" and "Show on Photo-Secessionist Myra Albert Wiggins Opens this Weekend."
• Here's a piece on the furniture store in the photo and the way until recently it has been often misidentified, "Address Change of 1904 and the Spaghetti Warehouse Move." It has a cyan reproduction of the image, and this post on the Columbia brand has a close-up of the storefront, "Belle Epoque Bike Bits."
• Watt Shipp and Paul Hauser had a shop in the brick storefront that replaced the wood-framed "cyclery" building. For more on the buildings where the parking lot just south of the Bike Peddler is today: "Early Bike Dealers Hauser and Shipp Remind us of a Better Downtown," "Staff Recommends Approval for Remodel on old Alessandro's Building Downtown" and the fabulous 360 panorama of the 1913 Moose Carnival, "The 360 Panorama at Fox Blue is Spectacular."
  
• A little later, like Otto J. Wilson, Watt Shipp moved to cars, and was part of the original partnership of the Valley Motor Company, "Vick Bros Sell to Watt Shipp et. al., who form Valley Motor Company."
• And in an earlier phase of bicycling, Ben Taylor, "The Story of Salem's First Bicycle: Ben Taylor talks with Fred Lockley," pictured a few times in front of what we now know is Smith's Brick.
  

And here's Wilson in a two-page booster spread when he was mayor from a century ago.

In 1920 Otto J. Wilson was mayor, Feb. 28th, 1920