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| | LEVEL OF DESCRIPTION: | Fonds | | No.: | PR2734 | | TITLE: | George's Cycle Ltd. | | CREATOR: | George's Cycle Ltd. | | DATE RANGE: | [ca. 1952] - 1980, predominant 1970 - 1980. | | EXTENT: | 243 photographs. - 21 transparencies. - 0.02 m of textual records. | | ADMINISTRATIVE | | HISTORY/BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH: | Heinz P. Glasmann (George) and Hilde Glasmann immigrated to Canada from Germany circa 1951. They initially stayed with relatives near Leduc before moving to Leduc and then on to Edmonton. In the first few years, Heinz supplemented his income with photography; family portraits, photos of business and the odd shot for newspapers. He was interested in photography his whole life but only took family pictures for the most part.
George's Cycle Ltd. was initially founded by Glasmann's father in-law, George Kinder, in 1963 at 9350 - 118th Ave. Shortly thereafter, in 1964, both Heinz and Hilda Glasmann entered the business. By 1965, Heinz has taken the lead role in the business and by 1967 George Kinder has retired from his role in the store. Customers attribute the name of the store to Heinz and eventually he is George to both customers and family. The founding of George's Cycle shop in the 1960s proved to be perfect timing as there was a bicycle boom and the store did very well. The height of the stores activity appears to be the predominant period covered by the album 1971 to 1978. The daughter of George and Hilda, Julie Loga, states, "George liked to say that he did pretty well for a fellow that came to Canada with $5 and a steamer trunk."
During the 1970s George Glasmann became well known in Edmonton, especially in the cycling community. George appeared on ACCESS TV in a program entitled, "All About Bikes," he established a course on bicycle maintenance at Northern Alberta Institute of Technology (NAIT) in 1971, and he promoted the store in a variety of ways including a cycling race team and the promotion of Edmonton's Wally Watts, who set out to pedal across Canada on a unicycle and then around the world, 1976-1978. After the death of George Glasmann, in 1975, of a heart attack, a memorial race was held in his honour on May 11 of that same year.
According to the donor and other family members after George's death, his wife, Hilda continued managing George's Cycle Ltd until 1978. Grayson Bain purchased the store from Hilda. However, according to the listings in the Edmonton Henderson's Directory, Hilda continues to be listed as the manager of the cycle shop until 1981. In 1982 Grayson Bain is listed as the manager of George's Cycle Ltd, after which the store turned to Ron Moore in 1984 and remained with Moore at least until 1987. There is no further information regarding management/ownership available after 1987 but George's Cycle continued to be listed in the Edmonton phone book until 2002. | | CUSTODIAL HISTORY: | The records were donated by Julie Loga, the daughter of George Glasmann (Heinz P. Glasmann), to the Provincial Archives of Alberta on two separate occasions. The parade photographs were received March, 2003 and the albums were received December, 2007. | | SCOPE AND CONTENT: | The fonds includes two photo albums, two scrapbooks and other records that document both the business activities of George's Cycle Ltd and the activities of its staff within the Edmonton cycling community. One of the photo albums documents George Glassman's participation in a TV episode called, "All About Bikes". There are nineteen transparencies which document the George Glassman Memorial Race.
Seven photographs document the [1952] Edmonton Exhibition Parade.
| | ARRANGEMENT NOTE: | Order of albums and scrapbooks maintained. | | LANGUAGE NOTE: | The material is in English | | GENERAL NOTE: | Information for the administrative history/biographical sketch is based on the records, information supplied by the donor and the Edmonton Henderson's Directory. |
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