Two-wheeled pioneer

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 18/07/2020 (2193 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

To mark Manitoba’s 150th anniversary in 2020, the Free Press features a weekly article from the archives of the Manitoba Historical Society. This story was first published by the Manitoba Historical Society in Manitoba History, Summer edition 2017.

This Manitoba story is about a remarkable young woman motorcyclist who, in 1914, did something exceptional on two wheels that no man could accomplish. And, for the record, this was two years before women achieved the right to vote.

Manitoba was a hotbed of motorcycle riding and racing in the early 1900s. So much so that the Canadian Motorcycle Racing Championships were held in Winnipeg during the First World War. There were at least 10 dealerships selling motorcycles, and approximately 1,200 registered motorcycles. The Manitoba Motorcycle Club (MMC) was founded in 1911 to promote the sport of motorcycling. It is the oldest motorcycle club in Canada and is reported to be the fourth oldest in the world.

As the president of the MMC in 2014, I was honoured to represent the club’s induction into the Canadian Motorcycle Hall of Fame. During my acceptance speech, I mentioned the MMC was way ahead of its time in Canada for recognizing women. In the crowd that night in Edmonton was Mary Johnson of Winnipeg, who is very instrumental in organizing events for Manitoba women motorcycle riders. She became very interested in who Sadie Grimm was and what she did.

The following summer, on July, 5, 2015, the Antique Motorcycle Club of Manitoba, which amalgamated with the MMC in 2010, organized a Sadie Grimm run out to Hunt’s Roadhouse north of Selkirk. Mary was contacted and told that if she would round up woman riders to participate in the event, the club would buy them their meal. Well, not only did she round up a large number of riders, but after lunch, they went on to re-enact the run to Winnipeg Beach, 101 years after Sadie did it on her 1914 Indian V Twin motorcycle.

Special thanks go to Dr. Carolyn and Paul Peters, who spent the better part of 2016 taking what little information I had on Sadie, and tracking down long-lost relatives in Manitoba and as far away as California. Here is what they garnered thus far.

The June 20, 1914, headline in the motoring section of the Manitoba Free Press read “Lady Wins Gold Medal.” What made this achievement remarkable is that nineteen-year-old Sadie Mildred Grimm succeeded where many male motorcycle riders before her had failed”.

Back in the winter of 1913-14, the Manitoba Motorcycle Club offered a medal to the first motorcyclist to make the trip from Winnipeg to Winnipeg Beach.

It was reported that there were numerous unsuccessful attempts to make the trip to the Beach with some motorcyclists trying while the ground was frozen. Others tried in the spring break up but found the swamps impossible.

On Sunday morning, June 14, 1914, Sadie Grimm left Winnipeg on her 1914 seven-horsepower Big Twin Indian motorcycle planning the attempt via Selkirk.

The Manitoba Free Press described her ride as follows:

“For twenty-five miles, she had to break gravel eight inches deep while going thirty miles an hour. She took several graceful slides but picked herself up unhurt. From Selkirk to St. Louis (now Petersfield) the road was fair but from then on it was all bog and pot holes. After riding paths and mudholes alternatively, Miss Grimm decided to try the railroad track. This she found very bumpy but much preferable to the mudholes interspersed with stumps and roots. After four hours of solid plugging Miss Grimm arrived at the Empress Hotel in Winnipeg Beach and was told she was the first one to make her way through this season. Sadie, not satisfied with her achievement, turned around after a few hours rest and rode back to the city via Teulon completing one of the most strenuous rides ever attempted by a Manitoba motorcyclist.”

On July, 5, 2015, a group of women from the Coalition of Manitoba Motorcycle Groups celebrated the centennial of this ride. The event was sponsored by the Antique Motorcycle Club of Manitoba and retraced the route of one of the earliest documented feats of motorcycle tenacity and skill by a woman anywhere in North America. As far as we have been able to determine, Grimm’s Gold Medal is the first known motorcycling prize awarded to a woman in a competition open to men. A few years earlier, American Clara Wagner was denied the trophy for winning an endurance race between Indianapolis and Chicago due to her gender.

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The seventh of eight children, Sadie Grimm was born in Milverton, Ont., in 1895. After residing in Gretna, and later in St. Francois Xavier, they settled at 589 Walker St. in Winnipeg.

She caught the eye of future husband Jim Cruikshank. Jim was a well-known amateur motorcycle racer having participated in a number of advertised competitions including a July event in 1911 at the Portage Races as a teenager. By 1913, he had opened an Indian Motorcycle repair shop on Main Street in Winnipeg across from what at that time were the newly built Yale and Northern hotels. In August 1914, Jim participated in the most famous motorcycle meet ever held in Manitoba. The City of Winnipeg declared a holiday for the three-day Dominion of Canada Motorcycle Championships, which included factory racers from the United States and several future Canadian Motorcycle Hall of Fame inductees. Jim would come second in the five-mile seven-horsepower sidecar event.

The year 1914 was a watershed for women’s rights in Manitoba, including the Nellie McClung-led mock parliament at the Walker Theatre that confronted Premier Rodmond Roblin’s statements on the prospect of women voting. The papers of the day included numerous articles on the evolving role and accomplishments of women.

“My trips on a motorcycle have been one long list of pleasures. In the first place, the motorcycle is a great teacher… it teaches (one) to be more independent on herself, to know that with a twist of the wrist she can control the powerful little machine that will carry her swiftly and safely wherever she wants to go. I don’t think anyone could recommend a better doctor than nature — plenty of fresh air and exercise are the greatest health givers… On the two-wheeler, one can take a spin into the country after working hours in the evening or early in the morning and Sundays and holidays can be spent entirely out of doors.”

Sadie and Jim were married on Sept. 9, 1914, at her family’s home. With the outbreak of the First World War, Jim volunteered for overseas service where he would join the newly formed Royal Air Force as a mechanic. They started a family immediately after Jim returned, with their only child Dorothy being born in 1920.

The trail on Sadie’s two-wheeled adventures runs cold after the war. A great-niece has described Sadie as a pistol. We know Jim later ran an electric engine repair business in Brandon. Daughter Dorothy passed away in 1981 after moving to California with her husband and two sons.

Sadie quietly passed in 1970. But on one day late in the spring of 1914, she did something spectacular that no one had done before her. And she did it twice!

For more information or to become a member of the Manitoba Historical Society call 204-947-0559 or email: info@mhs.mb.ca. The MHS is on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram as manitoba-history. You can see hundreds of other stories on our website at www.mhs.mb.ca.

Ross Metcalfe is a former Canadian history teacher. He is currently the national vice-president of the Antique Motorcycle Club of America and co-founder of the Antique Motorcycle Club of Manitoba. Ross also serves on the Council of the Manitoba Historical Society.