Читать книгу Wild Ride - Daniel Oakman - Страница 20

During the 1890s talented and bold riders crisscrossed the country in an endeavour known as ‘overlanding’. Indeed, barely a day went by without the newspapers enthusing about yet another cyclist’s titanic struggle across the vastness of the continent. Percy Armstrong and Robert Craig led the way in 1893, riding 3,200 kilometres from the Croydon goldfields in Queensland to Sydney, averaging 80 kilometres a day. The indefatigable Percy continued on alone to Melbourne, thus completing the longest bicycle ride undertaken in Australia to that point. In 1897 William Virgin powered his way from Perth to Brisbane in just sixty days. His 6,000-kilometre trip crushed Percy’s long-standing distance record. Just two months after Arthur blazed the trail, Bill Snell snatched the record for riding the Nullarbor, when he rode well over 3,000 kilometres from Menzies in Western Australia to Melbourne, in just twenty-eight days.

But as for riding round the entire country — was that even possible? Of the courageous few who joined the ranks of the overlanders, even fewer would consider cycling through the northern reaches of the continent, the wild frontier of white civilisation. The prize for being the first to conquer the entire country by bicycle dangled before them. But what kind of man would it take not just to dream it, but to do it?

* * *

Arthur’s moment had arrived. Perth’s main street buzzed with excitement. An unassuming man who shunned the limelight, Arthur looked out of place amid the crowds and the hullaballoo.

Stern-faced gents hovered in the background: agents, advertisers and company men. There was good coin to be made from these overlanders — just not by the riders themselves. Former overlander, and now cycling salesman, Percy Armstrong was the sole agent for Humber bicycles. A successful trip, properly promoted, could lead to thousands of new sales. He stitched up a deal with the West Australian newspaper whereby Arthur would be paid to send in regular updates via telegram about his progress. Exactly how much he was paid, and what he was expected to say in these reports, remain mysteries. With reputations on the line, a request to tell the unvarnished truth was unlikely to have been among those instructions.

Dunlop Rubber, after initially rebuffing Arthur’s request for sponsorship, was now in this up to its neck. Glowing reports from a bona fide overlander like Arthur would be marketing gold. The circle of commercial interests was complete. Good copy from Arthur meant Dunlop and Armstrong would spend more on advertising in the newspapers. Percy and Humber would sell more bikes, and Dunlop would maintain its stranglehold on the tyre market. Everyone would be a winner.