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(July 14, 1944 - February 3, 2008)
cyclist, ambassador, more
Sheldon
Respects
Eulogies
Obituaries
- by rob hawks
- by forbes bagatelle-black
- by plum
- in the boston globe
- on anarchocyclist.ca
- on belgium knee warmers
- on bent ride online
- on bicycle fixation
- on bike biz
- on bike friday
- on bike portland
- on bike radar
- on bike retailer
- on bike snob nyc
- on bikemagic.com
- on blacknell.net
- on chico gino
- on cyclelicio.us
- on cycleninja
- on cycling finial
- on cyclingedinburgh.info
- on dane 101
- on drumbent
- on harris cyclery
- on interbike
- on invisible summer
- on make zine
- on metrocyclist
- on patch
- on pedal revolutionary radio
- on see a puffin eat a fish
- on sfcyclotouring
- on south of the golden gate
- on the cycling curmugeon
- on underwire, via wired
- on universal hub
- on velonews
630 comments:
«Oldest ‹Older 601 – 630 of 630What Sheldon started lives on
http://sheldonbrown.com/5and5.html
I've been cycling for 27 years, but early on, rarely took the time to understand bicycles and the physics of cycling in depth.
As my love for and dependence on cycling has grown, I've returned to Sheldon's explanations time and again. His writing is considered and technically unsurpassed. To me, it is beautiful, it is sacred. Why?
Because it gives me the confidence to ride a bike at speed, understanding the forces involved and the potential and limits of the machine I sit on.
Thanks for your generosity of spirit Sheldon (and your family and Harris Cyclery) in making and keeping your life's work free to the world via the internet.
I recently moved from the US to France. French vintage bikes have interesting compatibility problems, which is when I started consulting his "francophile" page. It is used heavily also here in France. Thanks, great guy.
Sheldon Brown, American Hero.
He taught me so much through his website. Thanks Sheldon,
I've been reading Sheldon's pithy, funny and highly practical comments for the last month after discovering serious cycling. I might add I'm a mite before my sixtieth birthday. I had no idea I was reading posthumous comments. Sheldon, you were a rarity, a raving individualist and utter enthusiast who could communicate the joy and the passion you had. I miss you!
Clive F
What a loss!
My boyfriend recently bought a bike with hub gears and I had no idea how to fix them. Zinn let me down, but Sheldon was there for me, with brilliant advice on his website. I was lucky to be reading his site when he was still with us... and we are all lucky that his site lives on. What a man.
From Russia – Ural town Ekaterinburg - I express my condolences to family with this sad event.
Happy Birthday, Sheldon Brown!
Thank you for taking the time to share your knowledge to the world.
Still missing you Mr. Brown, still using your wonderful webpages. Had to figure out how to get a freewheel off and I knew right where to go. Thank you.
Miss you, Sheldon. You changed my life.
Of all the websites and people I've spoken to regarding bicycle repair/maintenance - your site has helped me the most. You will never be forgotten in the cycling community! Never ever!
RIP, Mr. Brown...
thank you
A real "mensch." Thank you, Sheldon for showing us the simple elegance and life-transforming nature of the bike...and how beautiful life is.
G-d bless you.
As a noob cyclist I learned alot from him RIP.
thank you for the infos
I think it is amazing that his knowledge is still teaching me things today. Without people like Sheldon to pass knowledge to other people so selflessly we'd be a lot worse off. Thank you Sheldon. Happy cycling.
I met Sheldon at Harris Cyclery when I lived in West Newton in the 90's. I was a Charles River Wheelman and started commuting to work and riding in the Pan Mass Challenge. He was always helpful and very kind and Harris Cyclery donated to my rides. I knew him to be a true gentleman and I was amazed at his knowledge of bicycles. He told me how he had many bicycles and different types and was the inspiration for my own bicycle collection. A fine man indeed. Rest in peace.
the world needs far more people like you Sheldon . thanks for all your help over the years in relation to maintaining my bicycles and making the world a more interesting place . you are still very much missed even though time has passed and I guess you always will be .
Bill in Devon , England.
Very fed up about this when a friend told me about it in a pub. Thanks for the info Sheldon, you were a star!!!
Still riding, still tinkering with bikes and still keeping my eye out for an interesting old part or two...thanks to Sheldon for showing me how.
Still need answers to all sorts of daft questions and still going back to his most brilliantly simple, concise and useful information.
Thanks Harriet and friends for keeping us all going.
He taught me much with his online sharing of bicycle knowledge. What a wonderful, giving type of person.
I was researching saddles about ten years ago and by chance found "Real MAN Saddles". Laughed so hard thought I'd pee. I've learned so much from this man. I bow deeply.
A long time has passed since I, as a child on a cheap children's bike, rode with any regularity. Now, some twenty years later, my family is taking up bicycling not only as an enjoyable pastime, but as an economical daily means of transportation and a key component of a more active lifestyle. By helping us learn how to properly use and maintain our bicycles, the information that remains available on Sheldon's site is enabling us to push ourselves beyond our previous limits while being a bit gentler to the world in which we live. My gratitude for Sheldon's life, wealth of knowledge, and generosity of spirit is beyond measure. I wish I had known him, or at least known of him, while he was still with us. RIP.
I started to work on bicycles rather late in life, and Sheldon's web site was one of the primary sources of useful information. All neatly written up, no nonsense, no voodoo.
I only realised that Sheldon is no longer riding the face of the earth about a year ago.
I learned so much, that I am now the neighbours' "Bicycle Repair Man".
Thank you!
I know that it is so much later than the event of his passing that I've found this page, but though I did know of his death in 2008 and was shocked and dismayed, he still matters to me now and I wanted to pay my respects. Tributes are laid at the graves of great persons no matter how many years they may have been gone.
Along with John Muir of "How to Keep Your Volkswagen Alive; A Manual of Step-By-Step Procedures for the Compleat Idiot", Sheldon tops my list of those who have emancipated a technological undertaking from the exclusive realm of industry insiders, without sacrificing a single element of accuracy - in fact, demonstrating repeatedly that his method of processing and relating data has the ability to convey the complexities of a system even better than those misguidedly preoccupied with loyalty to academic dogma. He mutated information in a way that not only entertained, but actually enhanced its fidelity. He was a world-class communicator.
And he is one of the reasons I have spent the last decade of my life working with bicycles. I began riding twice that long ago, but ten years past I discovered my first community bike shop, and was introduced to Sheldon as a reference. I have since consulted his words and links and stories hundreds of times. There have been times that I sought out his writings purely for the enjoyment of feeling the resonance of a fellow lover of Reynolds steel and hundred-and-fifty year old heirloom technology that will be relevant easily for another hundred-and-fifty. You know how even today you can go to a garage sale or a thrift store and find an eighty or hundred year old sewing machine that still gleams and sews perfectly, and probably still will for some yet longer time? Bicycles are one of the few technologies humans have invented that share that usability and original intention. No one gets this. No one understands the cultural, philosophical, and pragmatic relevance, or how rare those latter things are to find in combination. Sheldon did. I admired him for it.
I wish I had met him in person. I am so grateful that he left behind so much of himself to meet, embedded in the frontier of the electronic landscape. I hope he remains there forever, a figure not only of bicycling history, but, fittingly, one of the internet's more prolific and enthusiastic early settlers.
I want future bicycle mechanics to meet him. Because he will surely inspire them.
And to Sheldon himself, in whatever formlessness or form he now wears or does not: Farewell wherever you fare, you admirable weirdo and utterly remarkable man.
Thank you, Sheldon
We lost a great technical guru and beautiful human being when we lost you. Tailwinds, wherever you are!
Three days ago, while I was searching on the Web for some technical information concerning crank lenght, I stumbled over that Name, I never heard before. But since that moment I can't stop reading about you and your story Mr. Brown. My deepest respect! What we'd lost....
Hope to meet you one day...there above. ��
RIP Sheldon Brown.
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