For more than a century, Milwaukees bicycle messengers have called one place home. Full Cycle by Michael Horne
In 1891, an enterprising 12-year-old biked to the Downtown office of the Western Union Telegraph Company (today 219 E. Michigan St.) and convinced the manager he could deliver messages faster than anyone on foot or horseback. Thus, young Edward Steichen became Milwaukee’s first bicycle messenger. While Steichen went on to become one of the world’s greatest photographers (two years ago his 1904 Pond-Moonlight photo sold at auction for a record $2.9 million), the trend he started swept the nation. Western Union messengers, with snappy uniforms and company-issued bikes, became a fixture in major U.S. cities.
To chronicle the new enterprise, a photographer took a shot of these young boys posing beside their steeds in front of the company’s offices in 1891. Today, a copy of the photograph hangs at that location, now the Swingin’ Door Saloon & Eatery. The Swingin’ Door opened in 1933, shortly after the end of Prohibition. Mike Murphy, its one-time night manager, purchased the popular Downtown spot in 1973. And just like a century ago, it’s now a popular hangout for bicycle messengers. “They started coming around three or so years ago when the Swingin’ Door was a checkpoint for a bike rally,” Murphy says.
“It felt like home,” says Flynn Meyer, 26, a messenger with STS Delivery. Says co-worker Eric O’Gallagher, “I like the environment, the architecture and the people.”
The tavern is part of the 1879 Mackie Building: Upstairs is where a world center for trading cereal crops, the Milwaukee Grain Exchange, was active in the 19th century. As for the understated bar, its massive walk-in safe hints of earlier days, as does the beer barrel suspended from the ceiling. The messengers, often traveling in packs, chain their bikes outside and sip, or slam, cans of Pabst, three for $5.
“I like hanging with the guys here. It’s fun,” says Nicole LaBrie, 24, who rides for Breakaway Bicycle Couriers and is such a proud native that she sports a tattoo of Milwaukee County on her leg. “I started coming by around three years ago.”
Today’s messengers are about twice the age of the first bicycle couriers, tend to be intensely competitive and often joyously profane. But they like that history. Pointing to the 1891 photograph, O’Gallagher says, “I enjoy carrying on the tradition.”
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