Round Up

ROUND UP

JOE PARKHURST

BACK WHEN I started CYCLE WORLD, good old Floyd Clymer published Cycle magazine, our only real competitor. Later he sold it to a big New York publishing company. Instead of dropping out of the motorcycle scene, Floyd launched himself in the motorcycle industry as an importer. Then he teamed up with Friedel Munch of West Germany in the manufacture of the NSU-engined Mammoth. In addition, Clymer was a member of the CZ-Jawa distributorship for years, and, in the really old days, he was an Indian dealer, and...well, Clymer’s experience in the motorcycle industry is quite extensive.

As the publisher/editor/business manager, etc., for his magazine, Clymer was often pictured riding backwards, seated on the tank. I have never duplicated the feat, not that I tried. I preferred to leave that form of one-upmanship to the grand old man of motorcycling.

A recently received news release tells us Clymer has sold the Munch interest to an undisclosed client represented by an Eastern bank. Clymer contributed several years of valuable financial and business support to the Munch effort. The Mammoth was brought to the U.S. just three years ago, and production has risen to eight to ten units per month. Work on additional models was well underway at the time of the transaction.

Clymer continues in the industry with his line of Italian-made Indian motorcycles, and in the distribution of Royal Enfield in the West. Virtually to the man, the motorcycle industry has watched Clymer, waiting for him to retire from business and enjoy the fruits of his years of labor. Something tells me it’s going to be a long wait.

BMW FILES SUIT

A $250,000 lawsuit has been filed by the Bavarian Motor Works A.G. of West Germany (BMW) against publishers Little, Brown & Co. in New York, and the Literary Guild of America, over the book, The Arms Of Krupp. A similar suit is pending in Connecticut courts against its author, William Manchester. The suit contests a passage in the book that reads: “The sky continued to darken, money grew tighter, Bayerische Motoren Werke, Borgward, Hugo Stinnes and the big Haenschel Locomotive Works followed Willy Schlieker into oblivion.”

The writ states that the quoted passage is “false and defamatory, and did convey to the readers of the book that the plaintiff was insolvent (which was false and untrue) and had gone into bankruptcy and gone out of business and into financial ‘oblivion’ ” as had other firms named by the author in the quoted passage.

I can well understand BMW’s unhappiness with Manchester’s statement; the company is far from out of business. It has been a large, active, solvent firm since 1916. Business increased by 26.2 percent in 1968 alone, while exports rose 40 percent. Further to Manchester’s discredit, the Borgward firm was active, until just a few short years ago, making cars.