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James Longhurst

@jameslonghurst.bsky.social

4.5K followers 1K following 5.1K posts

college professor in the U.S. Midwest (all views mine); author of "Bike Battles: A History of Sharing the American Road" / "Las Batallas de la Bici." Shop intern, historian of urban and environmental policy, gravel grinder.

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James Longhurst @jameslonghurst.bsky.social · Oct 11

Oh hey, many new followers because of the bike community starter pack. Hello, I'm James Longhurst, a historian of urban and environmental policy. I wrote about the history of bike policy in the United States a few years ago; available from @uwapress.bsky.social

uwapress.uw.edu/book/9780295...

Bike Battles

Americans have been riding bikes for more than a century now. So why are most American cities still so ill-prepared to handle cyclists? James Longhurst, a hi...

uwapress.uw.edu

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James Longhurst @jameslonghurst.bsky.social · 11h

tonight on @pbs.org @pbswisconsin.bsky.social "From Rails to Trails," based on Peter Harnik's book of the same name. This history of the movement includes some coverage of the Elroy-Sparta's claim to fame as the first rail-trail conversion! #bike #bikesky 🗃️

pbswisconsin.org/watch/from-r...

Watch From Rails to Trails on PBS Wisconsin

The story of a 60-year struggle to convert abandoned railroads into trails for cycling and walking.

pbswisconsin.org

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Reposted by James Longhurst

Paul Fairie @paulisci.bsky.social · 12h

A Brief History of Let’s Bring Back The Good Old Days

🧵

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Reposted by James Longhurst

jamelle @jamellebouie.net · 14h

hey this is fun

Rebecca Spang @rlspang.bsky.social · 15h

And congratulations to @jamellebouie.net for winning the American Historical Association's Tikkun Olam Prize for promoting public historical literacy www.historians.org/award-grant/...

Tikkun Olam Prize for Promoting Public Historical Literacy – AHA

The Tikkun Olam Prize for Promoting Public Historical Literacy honors individuals whose work has promoted literacy in public culture.

www.historians.org

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James Longhurst @jameslonghurst.bsky.social · 19h

hey, I've now found through email correspondence that this #virginia #bikecentennial public history project exists. Is there anything else like this in any other states? 🗃️

bike76-va.vt.domains/home/pedal-c...

PEDAL: Call for Proposals – Bikecentennial Route 76 in Virginia

bike76-va.vt.domains

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James Longhurst @jameslonghurst.bsky.social · 20h

it's giving secret treaties/color books precipitating the Great War

Reposted by James Longhurst

Mondo Mascots @mondomascots.bsky.social · 20h

Sagappa Joe, the mascot of Sagami Women’s University, is a kappa who lives in the pond in the school garden, despite not being able to swim. He is renowned for his shapely buttocks.

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Reposted by James Longhurst

Adelita for Congress @adelitaforcongress.bsky.social · 1d

Speaker Johnson, you ready to swear me in?

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James Longhurst @jameslonghurst.bsky.social · 1d

disqualifying question from any assistant dean at any J school

James Longhurst @jameslonghurst.bsky.social · 1d

More like Scott Cruiser amiright

James Longhurst @jameslonghurst.bsky.social · 1d

full fenders are the bomb. full fenders with a beaver tail are the atomic bomb

James Longhurst @jameslonghurst.bsky.social · 1d

that poster for "The Thing" must have been on the wall at the first video store we went to as a family, and it is absolutely BURNED into my brain how it was hung on the wood paneling, I can see it now

James Longhurst @jameslonghurst.bsky.social · 1d

my goodness
🗃️

replica.seattletimes.com/popovers/dyn...

My book about a female cyclist was too radical for storytime - The Seattle Times

replica.seattletimes.com

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Reposted by James Longhurst

Endless Screaming @infinitescream.bsky.social · 1d

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

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Reposted by James Longhurst

University of Oklahoma Press @oupress.bsky.social · 1d

Out Now! "Projecting America: The Epic Western and National Mythmaking in 1920s Hollywood" by Patrick Adamson. www.oupress.com/978080619607...

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James Longhurst @jameslonghurst.bsky.social · 1d

The passenger-side wheels of those first two parked sedans are too far forward on their chassis, or the driver’s side are too far back. One or the other? Both? Either way it’s bugging me.

James Longhurst @jameslonghurst.bsky.social · 1d

Wearing an Apple Watch, but the angled parking is filled with 4-door sedans from the 60s/70s: some blend of a 1963 Chevy Impala / Plymouth Charger with double headlights in the first space, then nothing but 4-door sedans thereafter. No SUVs or trucks in sight. Not the USA of the Apple Watch era.

James Longhurst @jameslonghurst.bsky.social · 2d

academic monographs often have that sort of thing if you know how to dig through the footnotes. epic shade.

Reposted by James Longhurst

Mark Harris @markharris.bsky.social · 2d

Miss Major Griffin-Gracy, a pioneering trans activist from the Stonewall era on and a woman who lived an extraordinary life, has died. She was one tough customer. I have always loved this quote from her and if you've ever tried to ascertain the truth about a moment in history, you may relate to it.

“If you ask me something I’m gonna tell you the truth, you know. And it has to do with my perception of things, not theirs or what someone else has said. They aren’t me. They weren’t in my skin at that time. They didn’t perceive anything that I perceived. And yeah, I’m older and yeah, memory adds stuff or takes away stuff. Well, that’s just what it fuckin’ does. I’m still here and fuck you.”
--From New York City Trans Oral History Project Interview with Miss Major Griffin-Gracy, excerpted in The Stonewall Reader

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James Longhurst @jameslonghurst.bsky.social · 2d

I think parts of that essay on American Flyers ended up in the @wvupress.bsky.social edited volume: wvupressonline.com/node/854

Transportation and the Culture of Climate Change: Accelerating Ride to Global Crisis

Transportation and the Culture of Climate Change Edited by Tatiana Prorokova-Konrad

wvupressonline.com

James Longhurst @jameslonghurst.bsky.social · 2d

I wrote about “American Flyers” a decade ago, in time for its 30th anniversary. I guess that means that this year is the 40th anniversary (!)

bikebattles.net/2015/12/amer...

American Flyers – Bike Battles

bikebattles.net

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James Longhurst @jameslonghurst.bsky.social · 2d

… with typewriters, mimeographs, manual typesetting, the US mail, a WATS line, charter buses, work-study students, index cards, spit and gumption.

It’s not about the bike, it’s about the organizing.

James Longhurst @jameslonghurst.bsky.social · 2d

immediate impression: the most important untold story of Bikecenntennial ‘76 is that it was an organizational and logistical and communications nightmare/miracle. Forget the inspirational stories, this was a wild and chaotic first-time spin up of a whole national business and movement.

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James Longhurst @jameslonghurst.bsky.social · 2d

I’m at the Adventure Cycling Association headquarters in Missoula Montana today, working through some of their archival materials related to Bikecentennial ‘76 (50th Anniversary next year!) 🗃️

Me in front of a bookcase with bike books, with the title “Peter L. Bower Library” painted on the wall next to a bike frame

Stack of books and materials on a conference table with my laptop

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James Longhurst @jameslonghurst.bsky.social · 2d

including for "An Officer and a Gentlemen." And then he appears to have gone into TV scriptwriting, for "Tour of Duty" and "Walker, Texas Ranger" and suchlike, later producing for those and JAG and more. But credited as "Steve Smith," so I'm not 1005 certain it's the same person.

James Longhurst @jameslonghurst.bsky.social · 2d

"Steven Phillip Smith," listed as the author here, is almost certainly not a pseudonym for Steve Tesich, the author of the script for American Flyers and the previous Breaking Away. IMDB isn't sure, but Steven Phillip Smith is credited as the author of other novelizations . . .