Speedway cycles were a local suburban cycle shop of Adelaide situated at 25 Port Road, Hindmarsh (S.A) and later moved to new premises at Torrens Road, Kilkenny (S.A)
They were built by Bert Graham, born circa 1892 he was responsible for building bikes for many amateur and professional cyclists.
Graham was very prominent athlete in the Hindmarsh district ( SA) and was into a range of sports and at the age of 18 years Graham held the Australian record with a lift of 162 lbs. at his own weight of 9 St.
In 1912 Graham gave an exhibition of weight lifting and muscular posing in the West Torrens Football Club training room, with a large gathering to witness his feats and performance and soon after decided to open a cycle shop.
By the 1920’s Bert Graham was a big believer that junior development would lead the state into a cycling boom which later proved correct.
His Speedway cycles displayed great attention to detail in both examples of road and track bikes which displayed finely cut lugs, precision geometry and the use of the finest materials available.
All bikes were catered for including ladies bikes as were general utility bikes.
Speedway cycles are recognised by a brazed “S” , a painted “S” or badge on the head-tube. This symbol remained well past the war years with only a slight change design in the “S” , some models also carried the “S” into the fork crown.
Pre-war Speedway models are extremely rare, they feature round forks, arrow point lugwork with exquisite paintwork, post war years models carried very fancy lug-work up till late 1950s, most Speedway cycles carried a cursive script on the down-tube.
Badges are seen on pre-war models which carry the Bert Graham Builder with Port Rd. Hindmarsh prior to his move to Kilkenny and are generally a step down from the brazed models which remained his flagship models.
Many Speedway branded cycles were popular with the Findon skid kids, the name bearing a connection to the event.
Speedway cycles ceased operating around the late 1960’s.
