Milwaukee 6 Day - January 1932

So, while everybody is out racing in the sunshine, I decided to sit down and read the paper. The Milwaukee Journal ... January 7, 1932 to be exact and I came across this article:

January 1932, Milwaukee's first (?) Six Day Bicycle Race at Milwaukee's auditorium.
The article is hard to read the way it's archived, but very interesting none the less. Click on the bottom photo and read about the Kenosha rider, George Thomas who had some trouble with the track. A little research shows that this was George "Corks" Thomas, younger brother to Bobby Thomas who was one of the great cyclists to come out of Kenosha:

Bobby Thomas (Photo: CyclingArchives.Com)

"The next year, in front of an estimated crowd of 10,000 at the year-old Washington Park Velodrome — including Wisconsin’s lieutenant governor who arrived by airplane — Thomas became the first-ever national champion from Kenosha when he won all of his races en route to claiming the junior national championship.
When the national championships returned to Kenosha in 1930, Thomas won the senior national title and his brother George “Corks” Thomas captured the junior national title, electrifying the estimated crowd of 20,000.

The fact that two brothers won national titles in different classes in the same year with perfect scores was featured in Ripley’s “Believe It or Not.”

In a 1977 letter to the Kenosha Wheelmen Club, Bobby Thomas called Sept. 8, 1930 “the greatest thrill” of his amateur and professional career and added, “If I could do anything all over, THAT would be THE DAY!”

Thomas went on to captain the United States’ cycling team at the 1932 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles, where he lost in the quarterfinals to the eventual gold medalist. Later that fall, Thomas turned professional and competed in 68 pro six-day races."

I'll be searching for more gems like this and share them here on Peloton Star in the near future.
Remember to support Midwest cycling ... it's not just about the east and west coasts!