1952 Selection Gents Tourer
This superb French tourer is a new-old-stock bicycle. Until it was assembled just before I bought it in 2007, it had remained in its original packing box since 1952.
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Like the bicycle above, my two ‘Select 52′ cyclemotors, made by the same company, were also ‘new-old-stock’ from a Paris cycle shop that closed down in 1953.
You can see that these early ‘mopeds’ were not far removed from bicycle design.
In what was no doubt quite an innovative arrangement in its day, the Le Poulain engine operates via 3 gears on the back wheels. And there’s a spring inside the front handlebars for the front suspension!
Here’s a photo of it as it was stored, unused in the cycle shop.
Selection was a well-respected upmarket cycle manufacturer/ distributor; and Le Poulain made a variety of cycle-attachment engines to fit to bicycles.
Although I have come across various Le Poulain engines on cycles, I have never seen another model of the Selection/ Le Poulain.
