Yes, gentle reader, a car yarn in a timeline of motor cycling. I came across it while trawling the net for caption information to tie in with the pic of a Laurin-Klementz that completed the Paris-Vienna race. The byline attracted my attention: Charles Jarrott—a founder-member (in 1901) of The Motor Cycling Club, MCC president from 1908-22, stalwart long-distance motor cyclist…his name crops up regularly in this timeline. So I read the beginning of Jarrott’s story and found reference to Selwyn Edge, who was the MCC’s first president who won his first engine powered event (at Crystal Palace) on a De Dion trike in 1898. (Jarrott and Edge, like their contemporaries had cut their teeth on bicycles which might account for the astonishing powers of endurance). And then my tea went cold as I read on, entranced by yarn so ripping that it demands inclusion here. It’s mid-summer 1902 and we’re off to Vienna…
Motorcycle Timeline 