Schwinn Varsity

The Schwinn Varsity was a derailleur-geared lightweight adult bicycle built by the Schwinn Bicycle Company. Schwinn catalogues list a Varsity from 1951 as a three-speed lightweight, and from 1960 it became the drop-handlebar road bicycle most people remember, first with eight speeds and then with ten. It stayed in production until the mid-1980s. Tom Shaddox, writing on Sheldon Brown's site, calls it one of the heaviest lightweight bicycles ever built, yet also the single most significant American bicycle: at a time when American adults rarely rode and few had seen a derailleur bike, its low price and sound construction persuaded non-cyclists to try cycling. In its first years its sales, with those of the slightly dearer Continental, exceeded all other American derailleur bikes combined, and in total it was built in greater numbers than any other single derailleur model in the world. Millions were stamped out during the early 1970s bike boom.