1926 Raleigh Catalogue - Miniature Consumer Catalogue

 

Arriving earlier this week is this very interesting, very old Raleigh mini catalogue from around 1926. This catalogue is about 100 years old and gives a glimpse into the old-style, traditional bicycles of that period. 

The 1920s were a conservative period for Raleigh and Sturmey Archer. The companies built tried-and-true designs, such as the Model K hub and the various rod brake roadsters. These bicycles pre-date the more "modern" sporting and light roadster bikes we think of today. Raleigh and Sturmey Archer were more innovative in the 1930s, with the arrival of more cable brake models such as the "Sports" series, and newer hubs such as the AW and AB series. 

 

We also must not forget the terrible toll taken by the First World War, known in those days as "The Great War". The horrors of that war were still fresh in British memory in 1926. It is estimated that between 880,000 and 890,000 British servicemen were killed, with over 1.6 million wounded in a little over four years of fighting. This is not to mention the additional killed and wounded from the wider British empire and dominions.

After such trauma, the 1920s were both a conservative time for Raleigh and Sturmey Archer, and a more optimistic one generally in Britain, as it emerged from the horrors of war. Unfortunately, this optimism was wiped out by the great depression and the rise of Nazi Germany in the 1930s.

 

Raleigh's return to the United States was also still several years away. I've written previously about early "modern" lightweight bikes and an early Raleigh USA sales brochure dating to about 1934. Raleigh was basically conservative (or "bearish" in stock market speak) on the US market. They had a tough go of things in the 1890s and did not want to re-visit their failure in the US market. Eventually Raleigh enthusiast Hamilton Osgood, of Boston, Massachusetts, would push Raleigh to return to the US market in the 1930s.

Overall, this 1926 catalogue gives us a glimpse of Raleigh in the post-WW1 era - a fundamentally conservative time for Raleigh, before the innovations and upheavals of the 1930s. 

A pdf of this 1926 catalogue can be downloaded from the Classic and Antique Bicycle Exchange, HERE. 

A pdf of the 1934 Raleigh sales brochure can also be found at the CABE, see HERE.