All writing is collaborative, and I have many collaborators to thank.
I am grateful to Grand Valley State University and especially Dean Fred Antczak for supporting this project from its inception.
Rob Alt, Chris Haven, Russ Rhoads, Brent Smith, and Sue Stauffacher served as sounding boards throughout the process as I struggled to articulate the shape and style of the project. I thank them for their encouragement and enthusiasm. I am also grateful to Rob Alt, William Levitan, Mark Lewis, Amy Pence, Alice Olson Roepke, Sue Stauffacher, and Allen Whipps for providing thoughtfully detailed responses to initial drafts and many revisions. Anna Bouwkamp and Dan Royer also read versions of the book and offered valuable insights. I owe extra-special thanks to Allen Whipps for helping me trim the final “director’s cut” down to its present length.
Researching this book was a pleasure from start to finish, and I had plenty of help. Alexis Connolly, the great-granddaughter of Phil Sjöberg’s older sister, provided useful family history. Barbara Taylor, a relative of Dottie Farnsworth, sent me hundreds of newspaper articles she located once she realized she had such a famous name on her family tree. Barbara also put me in touch with Dag Hammar, my Swedish doppelgänger, who’s done incredible research into European women’s bicycle racing of the 1890s and needs to write a book of his own. Dag shared his ideas and information with me, and he took an early look at my “Lisette” chapters. He also put me in touch with Ann Hall, another nineteenth-century cycling enthusiast and author of Muscle on Wheels: Louise Armaindo and the High Wheelers of Nineteenth Century America. Like everyone else listed here, Ann generously shared what she knew about the women racers of the safety era.
I can’t imagine writing this book before the internet and the amazing digital archives available through the Library of Congress and other sites. I did on occasion have to track down materials and information the old-fashioned way, however, and I want to thank the helpful people at these museums and libraries: the Swedish American Museum and Newberry Library in Chicago; the History Center of the Minnesota Historical Society and the American Swedish Institute in Minneapolis; the New York State Library in Albany; the Olean Public Library in Olean, New York; the Akron-Summit County Public Library in Akron, Ohio; and of course the Grand Valley State University Libraries in Allendale, Michigan.
I surely wouldn’t have written this book at all if not for two strong women: my wife, Sue Stauffacher, who, along with her 2011 book, Tillie the Terrible Swede: How One Woman, a Sewing Needle, and a Bicycle Changed History, inspired me to take on this project; and Alice Olson Roepke, who has steadfastly safeguarded Tillie Anderson’s legacy and who eagerly and graciously shared her carefully preserved treasure trove of Tillie’s clippings and memorabilia. I also thank Alice for trusting me, of all people, to tell this story.