The vintage motorcycle literature and photo archive

As I had gone for many years "into the journalistic teachings" of my father and even later I have been in charge with journalism, Therefore I would like to continue with the legacy of my father - finally it concerns a collection of reports and photos, which records the history of two- and tricycles from about 1890 on and then specially the period 1930 till 1960. The archive was finally integrated into a collection of several archives and thus continues to live.

Personal memories

Around 1965 my father had begun to draw pencil drawings of famous motorcycles and to write motorcycle books as well as articles in magazines. Even the archive may had been usable only in the hands of my father, of course together with his improbable detail knowledge, nevertheless it represents my father’s life's work and - contents!

I personally connect many memories with various pictures and contributions, which are to be found in his files - e. g. we actually accompanied our father as children every weekend to motor sport competitions in the surroundings of Salzburg, where he went in his function as "Speaker to the audience":...there is a photo when I was an eight-years old boy at a speedway racing in Mühldorf, Bavaria, ... there is a photo of the airfield race in Langenlebarn, Lower Austria; further, many photos of the unforgettable Oldtimer Grand Prix" on the Salzburgring (surely this would be worth for a separate tale!); or pictures of the last hill-climbing-races on the Gaisberg, Salzburg, at the end of the 1960ies, where my father had been also in the function as “Speaker to the audience: there he had been “based” near by the grandstand of the honoured guests, which was half way up to the finish, right at the “Zistelalm”; that is why all results had been reported from the finish to my father still by field telephones. By the way, there existed a Motocross-Competition at that “Zistelalm” in the Sixties. Do you still remember the speedway races on the horse race court at Salzburg-Liefering? Or the "Grand Prix of Austria" for motorcycles on the motorway at Salzburg-Liefering, later on in Anif and on the Salzburgring? I still remember the time, when the chief timekeeper, Fritz Stengl told off all those people crossing unauthorized the line of the photoelectric beam recording the time of the racers – by the way, the crew of timekeeper had been "accommodated" in old public busses in those early days of road races at Salzburg …

Or do you known that in the first start-finish-building on the Salzburg Ring, the “speaker to the audience”, sat on the top floor, that this floor was statically falsely constructed - only max. three persons were allowed to stay on this floor at the same time.

Some photos of the archive

four motorcycle-asses playing cards; the photo shows from left: Wilhelm Herz, Germand motorcycle-champion and world record holder on NSU, H.P. Müller, multiple German motorcycle champion, motorcycle- world champion and world record holder, Reg Armstrong (Irland), five times motorcycle world champion and Rupert Hollaus (page in German, with some photos), the only Austrian motorcycle solo world champion (1954) - in an unimaginable scene for today, shoot in 1954.