George Pilkington Mills

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George Pilkington Mills (drawing from the Petit Journal of 1891)

George Pilkington Mills (born January 8, 1867 in London ; † November 25, 1945 there ) was a British cyclist and cycling pioneer.

Between 1880 and 1890, George Pilkington Mills drove the so-called end-to-end tour in Great Britain six times , the 1,440 kilometer route from the western point of England, Land's End , to the northernmost point of Scotland , John o 'Groats . 1886 was his best time on a Ordinary - Hochrad five days and 1 ¾ hours; this high-bike record still exists today. In 1891, he covered the same distance on a low wheel with pneumatic tires in four days, eleven hours and 17 minutes.

In 1891 Mills won the first Bordeaux – Paris event . It took him 26 hours, 34 minutes and 57 seconds to cover the 600-kilometer route. Because of his performance on the end-to-end tour , he was invited by the organizers of the race; besides him, there were 37 other drivers at the start, including three British who, like Mills, belonged to the North Road Club from Hereford . The British finished in the first four places. Mills, who was employed by a bicycle company "Humber", had to explain to the Bicycle Union that he himself had paid all the expenses he had incurred because of the race in order not to endanger his amateur status.

Mills studied engineering and later moved to the Raleigh Cycle Company in Nottingham . At the end of the 1890s, when his enthusiasm for bicycles was waning, his boss Frank Bowden sent him to the USA to find out more about more effective production methods and to purchase production machines. He later worked for various automakers and drove car races.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Pryor Dodge: The fascination of bicycles . History-technology-development. Bielefeld 2007, ISBN 9783768852531 , p. 87
  2. ↑ Briault: Août 1894. Les Pyrénées et l'Auvergne en Bicyclette , 2005, p. 5
  3. ↑ Raleigh UK Ltd on findarticles.com ( Memento from July 8, 2012 in the web archive archive.today )
  4. ^ David Herlihy : Bicycle. The History . New Haven and London 2004, ISBN 0300104189 , p. 310

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Mills, George Pilkington
BRIEF DESCRIPTION British cyclist
DATE OF BIRTH January 8, 1867
PLACE OF BIRTH London
DATE OF DEATH November 25, 1945
Place of death London