On the day he left Seattle, a newspaper article of June 18, 1896 comments that it is becoming the fashion to "visit the old folks at home by taking the wheel route rather than a train when an expert wheelman wants to go back East." It referred to my great-uncle, Will Sheneman, who had been living in Seattle for ten years, and was the nomad of the family. The article notes he is a 200 pounder who expects to be considerably thinner by the time he reaches Union County, Ohio where he was born, and where his folks live.

    Along with 25 pounds of luggage, consisting of a roll of blankets, a couple changes of clothing, a canteen, and a Kodak camera, he carried a notebook that has been handed down to me through three generations. It is filled with his day-by-day description of his trip including mileage covered, and an accounting of expenses. Leafing through its yellowed pages brings up vivid pictures of his adventures, trials, and triumphs. Since roads were few, and not numbered in those days, he lost the way many times, and had to retrace his route. He often walked the railroad tracks carrying his wheel where there were no roads. At the two mile long Stampede Tunnel on the Oregon Shortline Railroad he walked through with permission from the telegrapher. He writes:

 "Knowing it was two hours before the next train was due to pass under the mountain I entered the tunnel and groped in the darknes, but could not walk straight, running against first one rail and then the other.  So difficult was it to walk that I could make no progress, and would be caught by the next train if I did not go faster.  Finally I tried walking on the rail and using my wheel for a cane. In this way I made fairly good time and in fifty minutes I had passed through and was again in daylight."

   He followed the old stage-coach road in Oregon for several hundred miles. Since the railroads came through it had degenerated into no more than a trail, but evidence remained of channels cut by carriage wheels where the ground was cut up for ten or twelve rods wide.

   Travel was difficult through the sandy deserts where the temperature often reached 108 degrees. Will writes:

"About 1:00 PM I came to sand and had to abandon riding although the sand was so hot it almost burned my feet, and I would sink to my ankles every step. I could not lead my wheel but had to get behind and push.  Finally after my shoes were full of sand I took them off and walked in my stockings."

    In his journey he crossed the Nation’s largest rivers, and duly noted them. When he spotted the Columbia River in the distance from an overlook, he drank the last of his water thinking he could reach it shortly. 

Another hour's push brought me to another little elevation in view of the river, but this time it looked much farther away, and so on through the afternoon.  I finally became so thirsty I would cry out as loud as I could for water, although I knew that no one would hear me.  I also laid down on the boiling hot sand, and rested, but knew it would not do to lie there, or I might soon be so that I could not get up.  So I started again and tried to carry my wheel but could not do that.  Was almost given out when I struck the Columbia River, and drank the red, sandy water.  I was accommodated at the ferryman's cabin where I more crawled than walked.  The next morning I paid 50 cents to be rowed across to Umatilla in a small skiff.  The Columbia was very high and swift on account of the snow melting up in the mountains.  My wheel was tied fast with a rope so that when we got in the rough, swift water it would not get away from us, for I had made up my mind it was all I would want to do to look after myself.

   By June 24 he was nearing Pendleton, Oregon when he came to the top of a hill:

…..with roads running in every direction, and it was hard to decide which was the road I should take, but to stand there and wonder, would not take me to Pendleton, so I selected the road I thought led in the direction I wished to go, (something I very often was obliged to do) and started out over the sage brush prairie.  After traveling about four miles I came to the end of the road, and took another direction following an old trail.  After traveling until almost night I came to a road traveled much more than the others.  This I followed and soon began to descend a steep hill. My wheel getting the better of me, began to go down at a break-neck speed.  Not knowing where the stopping place would be or what was at the bottom, I thought the safest plan was to jump, which I did. I didn't stop until I had gone end over end for about thirty feet." 

   His overnight accommodations ranged from camping under the stars and with a group of emigrants headed west, to staying in the best hotels. But they also included bed-buggy beds in settlers cabins, and mosquito-plagued section houses.

   His Fowler wheel was sturdy, but not immune to tire punctures, broken pedals, and a broken seat. Sticky mud clogged the wheels, and his cyclometer broke several times. Along the way he met other wheelmen, and they sometimes joined him for a while. In Pocatello, Idaho he found his bicycle was a curiosity to the many wheelman there since they had never seen a Fowler Truss Frame before. At Montpelier, Idaho on July 3 he picked up a money order and found it almost impossible to get away from the crowd.

They thought it almost a miracle that such a light wheel would carry such a heavy load over the rough and rocky roads. I was never slow in assuring them tht I was riding the best and strongest-made wheel in the world.

    I purchased a pair of shoes, my first pair having been completely worn out by so much walking over rocky roads and the railroad.

   When he reached Chicago on July 29 he went to the Fowler Manufacturing Company.

I was soon on the elevator headed for the office on the top floor.  I entered it with myself and my wheel covered with mud.  They were very pleased to know that I had ridden one of their wheels, and my wheel was put in the window of their retail store on Dearborn Street, mud and all, with a card reading 'Ridden by W. H. Sheneman from Seattle, Washington to Chicago, 111, a distance of 2,633 miles without a break.  The wheel weighs 22 pounds.'  The wheel stood in the window for two days, and there was a large crowd around this window all the time.  I was taken to a first class hotel and orders were given to keep me as long as I wished to stay, that the Fowler Company would pay the bills.

   The Fowler officials also offered to give Will a new bicycle in exchange for his old one. At first he refused to part with the wheel that was like an old friend, but the next day he accepted their offer to pick out any wheel he wanted in return for his. They also provided him with a bicycle suit, pants, coat, sweater and cap. Thus attired, and on his new bike, he went to the Howe Studio on Paulina Street to have a cabinet photo made. It seems he reached his expectation of becoming thinner since he doesn’t look like a “200 hundred pounder” in the picture.

     In the west he averaged about 40 miles a day, but in Nebraska he “made a run of 94 miles, my biggest one yet.”

    He had sent regular dispatches to the Marysville Tribune, signing himself "Roving Boy." As he wheeled his bike up the path to his brother’s home at Sheneman’s Corners west of Pharisburg on August 10^th, he was hot and tired, but elated at finishing what he had started nearly two months before. My mother, who had celebrated her sixth birthday the day before, never tired of relating the joy of that day when “Uncle Will came home!”

    When asked if he intended to make the return trip on a 'bike', his answer was "No! I never intend to cross the Rocky Mountains and the sandy desert again on a bicycle. I think anyone who makes the trip once will not be anxious to repeat it when it can be made just as cheap by rail in less than five days."

   As good as his word, Uncle Will’s next trip was made by train in 1897, across the continent and back with his uncle, George Wash Mackling. I’m editing a book that will include his published articles, and will introduce my great uncle to a new audience. Every family should have an “ Uncle Will.”

From Log of Will Sheneman

Riding an 1895 Fowler Trussframe wheel, 95 pounds,

 from Seattle, Washington to Marysville, Ohio

June 18--August 10, 1896

Overnight Stops

By Trella H. Romine  

February 18, 200