A HALF-CENTURY'S RIDES: A Bicyclist Celebrates Fifty Years in the Saddle

Bob Austin was likely the only person to ride a bicycle down the West Coast in the summer of 1961. If he wasn't, he is surely the only one to do it alone, at the age of 16 and in 14 riding days. And he is surely the only one to have repeated the ride a half-century later.

In 1961, Bob kept a diary of his high-speed Odyssey. That diary, written in blue ball-point pen on a pad of complimentary Union Pacific stationery, survives and serves as one of the two main sources for his book. The second...