Unconscious Cyclist

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 916, 8 March 1930, Page 18

Unconscious Cyclist

Rode 70 Miles Without Knowing Anything About hi

INETEEN - YEAR - OLD juj John Rose took our his bicycle, carelessly flung his leg over the saddle, and moved off slowly i down the road from his home at Hatfield, near Doncaster, England. lie was going to visit his uncle, who lived three miles away at Thorne . . . that would not take him long. So he rode on, pedalling easily. But he did not reach his uncle. Night fell: the hours passed; and John Rose still rode on . . . and on and on. He forgot where he was going. I-Te did not notice the landmarks he passed. He merely rode on. . . . At Northallerton—7o miles from Hatfield—a .strange, exhausted figure fell from a wobbling bicycle which exhausted limbs could no longer control. It was John Rose, who had ridden on till he dropped.

Police picked him up. took him to I the infirmary—but John Rose had forI gotten, among other things, his own j name. 1 Not till next day did he remember j it and remember the uncle at Thome. • And the upshot was—the uncle j whom John Rose had set out to visit , had to journey to Northallerton himj self to restore to his parent the wan- ! dering visitor, j Rose said: “I set out to ride three miles to ! Thorne to see my uncle, but changed my mind and rode to Doncaster. 1 i remember nothing after reaching | Doncaster. ! “I can just remember falling off my i bicycle and being taken to the police station by someone.'* He had riddeti the 70 miles with- ! out food or refreshment. But long journeys are in young j Rose’s blood. I Recently he and his father tramped ! 90 miles, with a lift now and again, to I South Yorkshire, in search of work, j They succeeded in finding it at Hat- ! field