Scott Swanson
Of The New Era
In 1955, when Butch Brown was 10, he got a job delivering newspapers around Sweet Home.
“I was the youngest delivery boy the Democrat-Herald had at the time,” he said. Every day he’d go down to the old delivery office, located where the Post Office is now, and fold his papers.
He needed the money for a bike, and he got Lloyd Mulholland, owner of the Western Auto Store, to let him make $5 monthly payments on a Schwinn in the store.
“For a kid 10 years old to have a bike he’d paid for himself was pretty unusual,” said Brown, now 59. But it was the only way, as his father worked in a sawmill and “you didn’t just go out and buy your kid a bike because he wanted one.”
Two years later, he upgraded to a bigger, better model – a 26-inch, black and white job.
“It was a pretty ritzy bike,” Brown said.
Eventually, Brown quit delivering papers – his last delivery job was with the Oregonian.
When he was through with the bike, it was passed down to his younger brothers, Dennis and Steve. Eventually, it went on to his uncle and aunt, Karl and Rosemary Brown, who had seven children.
Butch Brown, who is a heavy equipment operator and maintenance worker for the Linn County Road Department, said he had hankerings to get that bike back from time to time, but it was always in use, most recently by his uncle.
“You have no idea what that bike has been through,” Brown said. It’s just something else.”
Two years ago, Brown got a Christmas present. He said he thought he might be getting a Harley, but instead he got his old bike back.
The rear fender was a little dented – he said he thinks his uncle may have straightened it after years of youthful abuse. The pedals were modern, but it had what Karl Brown said was the original front tire and tube.
“The fact that they kept it for all those years is amazing,” said Karen Brown, Butch’s wife of 38 years. She was the one who arranged for the bike’s return.
“I begged for years to get it back,” she said. “It was pretty emotional when Butch got that bike.”
Butch agreed.
“I never thought I’d get it back,” he said. “I was speechless.
“This baby has stood the test of time,” he said proudly, flicking some imaginary dust off the fender after pulling the bike out to show a visitor. “It’s a real tribute to the Schwinn bicycle company.”