The Spinning Crank

Hi everyone! Jessica here. I’m starting to think our e-Bulletin’s name is a little, well, outdated, and I’m looking for new suggestions. To get everyone’s gears turning, I’ll start with a question:Do you remember the Spinning Crank?Silicon Valley Bicycle Coalition used to send out a physical newsletter every other month called “Spinning Crank.” It featured opinion pieces, letter writing campaigns, updates, and a list of all the upcoming club rides. As the world transitioned to the digital age, so did SVBC, and in 2008 our newsletter was ditched in favor of a paperless e-Bulletin, blog posts, an online calendar, and email blasts to elected officials.As the Membership and Outreach Coordinator, I was curious about what our communications looked like in a pre-internet era and dug up a newsletter from 40 year ago. The photos of it are available in this blog post and have also been uploaded to a Facebook album.Of note, bicycle activists were advocating for the right to ride on freeway shoulders (front page), environmentalists were fighting to require a deposit on beverage containers (page 4), and one of our activists expressed dismay that only one bicyclist showed up to a Sunnyvale City Council meeting to speak in favor of bike lanes (page 5).To be honest, almost every article in the old newsletter was mesmerizing, but rather than recap it all, I encourage you to flip through this digital copy of the May-June 1978 issue of Spinning Crank and see what’s changed in the last 40 years—and what hasn’t. Happy reading and happy riding!And if you have any suggestions for a new e-Bulletin name, I’m all ears. Reach me at jessica@bikesiliconvalley.org.