September 18, 2025
The death of Robert Redford this week is a reminder that this actor appeared adjacent to two of the most memorable appearances of bicycles in Bikecentennial-era films. In Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969), co-star Paul Newman rides a bicycle with co-star Katharine Ross perched on the handlebars, while the memorable “Raindrops Keep Falling on My Head” plays in the background. The scene includes trick riding, a crash, and a chase by a bull.
The bicycle was deemed so important by the marketing team that an image of two actors on a bicycle was included on a publicity poster.
Trick bicycling was one of the ways to popularize the sport in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, the setting for the film. Frank and “Rube” Shields, professional trick bicycle riders, gave a demonstration in Pine Bluff, Arkansas, in early 1901. “Rube” was reportedly “the only bicyclist in the world who has ever accomplished the feat of riding down the steps of the National Capitol, in Washington.”
Bud Snyder, an American cyclist, dazzled crowds in London by doing somersaults while riding on his bicycle, as reported in the News Letter Journal. His most marvelous trick “consists in starting from one end of the stage, jumping his machine on to an ordinary table, riding down some steps at the other end, doing a clean somersault over another table, landing on the other side, still riding his bicycle, and up a spring board, from he dives off his machine while it is still in motion, plunging into a tank of water ahead.”
Several years later, and almost fifty years ago, a bicycle wheel appeared in the film All the President’s Men. The bicycle belonged to Carl Bernstein, portrayed by Dustin Hoffman, the Washington Post colleague of Bob Woodward, portrayed by Robert Redford. The bicycle wheel is just a prop, not a plot device, included as one more way to demonstrate the authenticity of the sets. Reporter Carl Bernstein was a cyclist, who removed the front wheel of his bicycle to discourage thieves. Before becoming famous for breaking the Watergate story, Bernstein wrote about cycling in DC and actually played a notable role in changing the laws about bicycles in the nation’s capital (to be discussed in a future post).
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