Wall of Death BSA

Great photo from the fifties or sixties of a wall of death bike and rider. The guy looks comfortable with the bike so it would be a good guess that he was a wall rider. Anyone out there recognise him?

Rigid framed BSA A7s were the post war British bike of choice for the wall after an Indian. They seem to have been used at several different walls, notably with Tornado Smith at Southend and at Margate. I've seen pictures with the BSA logo painted on to the wall itself so presumably BSA were sponsoring walls at one time.

Any further info on the picture gratefully received.

BSA A7 Wall of Death bike.

Little Nap is back

Many thanks to Nick Smith for magicking up this article about Little Nap. It dates from c1914.

For some reason I had made the assumption that Little Nap was a Stateside act but it appears he was part of the UK musical hall circuit. Wouldn't it be great if there were some movie footage of him out there. The combo seems to have been fully working so did he pedal it off and start it by himself? Any further information greatly appreciated.

Little Nap and fiance with their Hobart made, JES powered
combination.

Little Nap, The Napoleon of the Chimpanzee World

Little Nap was featured in this blog some four years ago. Just recently the gods very much smiled down on me and I've come across this image of the little fella with his sidecar again, this time with a human passenger. It's an image I've never seen before. The boy looks pensive as well he may. The image is a photographic postcard, I couldn't say if it has been reproduced in multiple copies or not and it was printed in the UK. There isn't a lot of information out there about Little Nap, a shame as he certainly deserves a place in the pantheon of anthropomorphic sideshow greats.

If posting this image on other sites please acknowledge the source.

Little Nap and mildly uncomfortable passenger.

Motorcycle Trapeze Act

I've no idea where or when this photo was taken but it is one impressive act. The motorcycle is only just in frame. I'd love to see a movie clip of the performance.

Circus trapeze act with motorcycle.

Audacious tricks and high speed thrills - vintage motorcycle acrobats

A selection of motorcycle acrobats. Mainly from the heyday of such activities in the twenties and thirties and mainly french in origin. Most details seem to be lost in the mists of time so look, enjoy and make up your own narrative.

Nowadays this would possibly be filed under child labour.
No idea of the origin of this image. Very cool bike though,
a definite proto-bobber look going on.

The caption says it all, 'Toto Marnay, the youngest motorcycle
acrobat in the world'.

It's a pretty good stunt for the day and a great picture. Really
captures the feeling of speed. The copy and paste faces are
however quite amateurish.

The motorcycle is a Terrot and it looks like he is riding a
velodrome but further details are unknown.

The Cinzano riders were a popular feature of the Tour de France
caravan in the fifties and sixties.

The Danil's act.

Paul Poitte. 'Champion of acrobatics'. 

The acrobat team is Feldgen and Beiss and they're on tour
around Europe by 'water and land'. The boat is an 'imitation'
Flettner Rotor vessel. The Flettner Rotor system was
patented by German engineer Anton Flettner in 1922. The
system uses the Magus Effect for propulsion. The Magnus Effect
is a force acting on a spinning body in a moving airstream which
acts perpendicularly to the direction of the airstream. Essentially
to put it simply thrust is generated from air flow over spinning rotors.
The rotors are turned by a motor and once the vessel is moving forwards the
airflow over the rotors can provide additional thrust. Flettner
built a prototype in 1925 which sailed successfully but was found to
be inefficient compared to conventional diesel powered vessels.
Several attempts have been made since to resurrect the concept
but all have fallen down on grounds of efficiency.
It seems likely that Feldgen and Beiss were engaged to tour
Europe promoting the Flettner Rotor. The motorcycle looks
like it is from the late twenties.

Quite a nifty trick by the Celmar's.

Those Celmar's are at it again. This
time a chair, or perhaps a pair of
chairs are involved

A static sidecar balance by the 'Equipe Boston'. Along the
bottom there is a list of components though to me it looks
like they are of no relation to this bike.

According to the caption Luciano is here engaging in an
audacious feat of acrobatics at 80kmh. Not to lessen his
achievements but looking at that bike 80kmh is a pretty
audacious claim.