Vista bikes history

I think your bike may be Columbia made. Vista seems to have also sold some fairly generic 70's road bikes too, according to the internet these road bikes were made in Taiwan or Japan. SSG said:. Click to expand Information about Vista bicycles is elusive. I'm lucky enough to have received an owner's manual with one Vista speed I picked up last year.

It was a yellow men's bike very similar to a Varsity, called an "Esquire". This industry group formed somewhat in objection to Schwinn's efforts in the late 60s to eliminate the small-town dealer who sold feed and fertilizer, or tractors, or cars, or hardware, or whatever alongside Schwinn bikes. So a group of investors got together, apparently with Columbia Westfield MA and numerous other suppliers, and put together a line of bikes.

There were bikes in all popular categories. There were sales catalogs offering their products both to the public and to entice dealers to carry the line in their stores.

Seem to have been sold in smaller-name chain stores. Some shops surely sold Vistas as their other brand, separate from the Schwinns. They were American made, with a lot of Columbia design features to the frames. The logo is crude but kind of cool. I don't know how late they were in business, but they seem to have gone away by or so. Hope that helps.

Last weekend I talked to Rob and he beat me to the post and he had told me things he knew of Vista. I thought they were a not bad of a bike. Mine was remade into a swing bike from a ladies 5-speed. Hmm, I know of a local artist that might be looking for a bike like that. INterested in selling? Put a chain on it already! Awesome, thanks Rob. You've got a lot of sweet bikes btw Graylock, White Shadow- Hopefully I'll have this one transformed soon too.

While Rollfast bikes were high quality machines their design was decidedly more conservative than a lot of their contemporaries. An exception would be the Hopalong Cassidy bikes complete with conchos, fringe, and a simulated horse hair saddle. The Rollfast name would continue until when the Snyder Co. The Westfield Manufacturing Co.

Many brands were manufactured under Westfield but their in-house brand was Columbia. Westfield bought many bicycle companies such as Miami who made the Flying Merkel, and Racycle among others. Some of the most desirable balloon tire bikes ever made were produced by Westfield for Sears under the Elgin brand to include the Bluebird, Skylark, and Robin. The company enjoyed postwar success but like other American companies succumbed to imports and production cost and ceased operations in Iver Johnson bicycles were typically high grade machines and manufactured most of the parts for their bicycles rather than relying on other manufacturers.

The Super Mobike featured stainless fenders, an octagonal battery tank, a unique crank assembly, and a hornlight. Iver Johnson ceased bicycle production in While its initial offerings were rather plain by the company introduced some exceedingly stylish bikes such as the Safety Streamline followed by the Super Streamline bicycles.

Huffman was one of two manufacturers to produce bikes for the war effort Westfield was the other and these military models are highly sought after. The company changed its name to Huffy in but the bicycles had been branded as Huffy since Although the Huffy brand still exists all production is in China.

In the Evans Products Company bought the bicycle division from Colson and Evans-Colson bicycles were sold until Some of the more interesting bicycles produced were the Hi-Lo which contained a rudimentary two speed transmission in the crank hanger and was shifted by a shifter mounted to the frame. Colson produced some of the most outrageous paint schemes in the s on its top-of-the-line Commanders and Imperials.

Colson used a suspension consisting of rubber cushion s on some of its top models. Optimised Tyre Clearance. The Factor Vista is one bike that can almost do it all. This all-road is at home on long pavement rides and hardcore gravel grinders alike. The Factor Vista is a bike that bucks the segmentation trend and can hold its own in a wide variety of uses, from cyclocross to gravel to road riding. Read Full Review. Read Full Article.

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