Roswell Cycling Festival - Alive and Rolling

If you’ve noticed decorated bicycles around Roswell, you’ve experienced the Moving Parts of the Arts from the Roswell Cycling Festival. Local artists and businesses decorate bicycles and place them out to celebrate cycling in Roswell.

This Saturday, 4/30, the festival kicks off in high gear with the Roswell Cycling Festival Mountain Bike Day at Big Creek Park - Big Creek Pump Track Event, starting at 10 am. Riders of every age are welcome to come out to Big Creek to experience the 2 new pump tracks, one for beginners and the other for intermediate/advance riders. The pump tracks are small, circular courses with berms and rollers professionally built to teach kids and adults the skills necessary to safely participate in true off road trails. Skills clinics on the Roswell Bike Big Creek Pump Track, sponsored by RAMBO and Roswell Bicycles, will continue all day long, and teaching the skills clinic will be provided by our Downhill Team.

Sunday is the Historic Roswell Criterium. Speed, spectators, scenery – Historic Roswell Criterium has it all. Check out www.roswellcyclingfestival.com for full details on the races and all of the weekend’s events.

Never heard of a Criterium? According to the Criterium’s website, a Criterium is:
The most common form of American racing, the criterium, is a multi-lap race of 25 to 60 miles held on a closed course generally a mile or less in length. These races, which usually last one to two hours, are extremely fast -- 30 mph and up -- as the cyclists jockey for position and sprint for lap “primes” (cash or merchandise prizes, pronounced “preems”). The short closed course, generally with both right- and left-hand corners, makes this type of racing easy to watch for spectators and more accessible for the media.In criteriums, it’s “go” from the gun as the strong riders force the pace and the weaker ones struggle to hang on. Quick acceleration and bike-handling ability are paramount -- a successful criterium rider will be able to dive into a tight corner at high speed, leaning the bike over at a gravity-defying angle, then power out of the turn and instantly set up for the next. It’s important to stay near the front; the first few riders in a pack can take a corner with little or no braking. Those toward the back jockey for the best “line” through the turn, brake, then sprint to catch up with the pack as it accelerates, developing an “accordion” effect.

Race Times: Races begin at 11 am and the last race of the day is an 80 minute professional race that begins at 6 pm. There is even a children’s race where children who complete the 3-5 pm Bicycle Safety Rodeo come out on the professional track for a 200 yard race.

Spectators will gather all along the route so bring your chairs and come prepared for a fun day. For those who prefer retail therapy over sports, part of the race route is right next to a quaint shopping district on Canton Street. Art, antiques, gifts, clothing, and many one of a kind items are found in the shops in the area, as well as fun restaurants, coffee houses, and tea rooms. There’s something for all ages to enjoy.

Bargain Hunter on the Loose!

I love bargains! A bargain is even more exciting when I can get a discount on something that I was going to buy, anyway. And hey, if I can support the economy of the town where I live and work, well that’s even better than a Buy-One-Get-One-Free-Offer in my book.

That’s why I always check out the most current Find It All Roswell offers before heading out to shop or eat, before I get work done on my car, before… well, you get the idea.

Here’s how I do it: First, I went to the Roswell Visitors Center (617 Atlanta Street) and picked up my Find It All Roswell VIP Card. They’re FREE and that’s the perfect price for me. Second, since new offers are added each week, I check finditallroswell.com/offers and look at the categories on the right side of the page to see if there are offers that are calling my name. Since I love to eat and would prefer that someone else do the cooking and clean up, Restaurants is one of my favorite categories, followed a little too closely by Shopping. Once I click on the category, I can then scan the offers listed and print coupons for those that interest me. Sometimes, I’m not sure exactly what I want so I’ll click on finditallroswell.com/offers/all-offers to get the entire list to print and take with me.

The cool thing about this program is that by supporting local businesses, I’m helping to keep the ones I love in business and I’m also actually supporting the Roswell services that I love, like the awesome parks, by keeping those businesses in Roswell.

Of course, if I just checked the Special Offers section, I’d miss a bunch of other great Roswell businesses that participate in the program but don’t happen to have a current offer. Just go to http://www.finditallroswell.com/ and click on Businesses by Category and you’ll see a list of participating businesses for just about anything you’d need from Accountants to a company that will put a Wi-Fi hotspot in your business so that you can entice us geeky types to come and check you out.

It’s sooooooo easy to save money and support Roswell! Go Find It All in Roswell!

Trivia

Only someone who hasn’t read a newspaper or seen an Internet news site, this week, has missed the fact that 150 years ago, this week, Confederate forces fired on Ft. Sumter, SC, starting the American Civil War. Being someone who has completely esoteric facts (a.k.a. trivia) running around in my brain, crowding out what I really need to remember, I’m intrigued by some of the more interesting facts about the American Civil War.

An estimated 300 women disguised themselves as men and fought in the ranks.

The first time in U.S. History a rifle was used successfully under water during armed conflict occurred in Roswell, GA as Union troops were crossing the Chattahoochee River at Shallow Ford on their way to the Siege of Atlanta in 1864. The Spencer repeating rifle was a manually operated lever-action, repeating rifle fed from a tube magazine with cartridges

The war was the bloodiest conflict in American History, claiming more lives than The American Revolutionary War, World War I, World War II, The War of 1812, and the Vietnam War combined.

Twice as many solders were killed by disease during the war than were killed by battle wounds.

Many doctors who saw service in the Civil War had never been to medical school but had served an apprenticeship in the office of an established practitioner.

Before the Civil War, most nursing care was provided at home. Before this time, there was a concern that a woman would damage her reputation by caring for a man she was not related to. Women like Clara Barton and even author, Louisa May Alcott, proved this notion false and laid the groundwork for today’s modern nursing profession.

The first time artillery fire was directed for an army by aerial reconnaissance occurred on 9/24/1861 by balloonist Thaddeus Rowe.

There were more Northern-born Confederate generals than Southern-born Union generals.

The Civil War produced the first submarine to successfully sink its target. The 40-foot-long Hunley was operated by eight men turning a hand crank attached to her propeller shaft. The Hunley sank and was recovered three times during trial runs before it was successful.

When General William T. Sherman declared that “the women will howl,” he had no idea that he would also anger women in the north when northern newspapers reported about his commanding that 400 women and children mill workers in Roswell, GA be arrested and charged with treason. Their crime? They all worked in Roswell’s woolen and cotton mills helping to manufacture cloth, ropes, and tenting used in the Confederate war effort.

Both sides assumed that the war would be short lived. The South assumed that the North would just let them go without much of a fight and the North assumed that their military superiority would quickly overpower the rag-tag Confederate troops.

The Battles of Bull Run and the Battles of Manassas were two names for the same battles. Confederate troops named the battle for the near-by city of Manassas and Union troops name the battle for the stream that flowed through the battleground. Figuring that it would just be a short skirmish, Washington DC residents loaded up their carriages with picnic lunches and drove out to watch the beginning of the battle.

Rev. Nathanial Pratt, Roswell Presbyterian Church’s first minister, saved the family valuables without telling a lie about where they were. Just before General Kenner Garrard’s troops made it to Roswell, his sons loosened the wide pine boards leading to the eaves. They called the space on the south side of the house "Augusta" and the space on the north side "Macon". Everything of value was hidden there and then the boards were slipped back into place. The hiding places were never found during the two-week occupation. When asked about various items, their truthful response was always given: "It was sent to Macon or Augusta."

Would you like to find out more about Roswell and the Civil War? Just check out www.visitroswellga.com/civil-war.html