Apr 1, 2011

Carl Fisher's Roads

These pieces accompany an article in the May/June issue of Muse Magazine, titled 'Carl Fisher's Roads.' It's a textbook excerpt about Carl Fisher, an entrepreneur in the early part of the twentieth century who had his finger on the pulse of America's growing need for personal transportation and the hurdles that needed to be overcome.

Highway engineer F.H. Trego recommended packing the following items on a long-distance drive in the early 20th century: an ax, shovel, and four-foot hardwood plank, 50 feet of heavy rope and 16 feet of cable, an extra engine valve, two jacks, two spare tires, three gallons of oil, a pile of cooking and camping gear, and a small pistol.
The first roads were nothing more than glorified game trails.
Early bicycles were extremely dangerous, and the big-wheel bikes (called "ordinaries") were essentially brakeless.
One of Carl Fisher's terrific business models as a bike salesman involved throwing a bike off the roof of a building and then giving a free one to whomever lugged the wreckage back to his shop. He also used a similar tactic when he sold cars later on.
A small diagram of the different layers of the typical road.

Prints of the top three images are available for purchase here.

I always love working for Muse AD John Sandford, though I have a tendency to bite off a whole lot to chew on in his assignments. These are all half or quarter-page spots, but I thought they'd make pretty nice prints, so I ended up working on them quite a bit bigger. Ah well!

26 comments:

  1. Wooooaaaaaaaaah ! I WONDERLOVE it ! All of it !

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  2. You've outdone yourself! Beautiful work :)

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  3. wowowow all Beauties!! The bike one is my absolute fav! great work as always!

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  4. These images are EPIC!!!! EPIC!!!!
    E
    P
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    So epic. ;^)
    The guy throwing away his damn bike makes me wanna do the same - this is how inspiring it is.
    All the best man!

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  5. beautiful stuff sir sam bosma (i just knighted you)

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  6. wow wow woww so beautiful, these pieces are amazing.

    They almost feel a bit miyazaki to me, specifically the guy throwing the bike of the roof. Can't put my finger on it but I could this as a scene from a movie

    great work

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  7. Wow, these are so lovely! I especially love the first one and the one of the man throwing the bicycle off the roof...

    windeater.blogspot.com

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  8. Same these are dope! Well done sir!

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  9. Really fantastic group of pieces. Those cyclists just became my desktop background.

    My gosh, I love this palette.

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  11. You're totally right! You wouldn't see the seat on the second guy, but I definitely forgot to draw one for the big-wheel. Must've lost it somewhere along the way.

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  12. Followed ya here through Drawn! Beautiful illustrations, and fun characters too! :D Awesome work!

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  13. These are perfect Sam, I especially love the compositions and colors in this pieces!

    -Brun

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  14. Hey these are SWEET! So well drawn, designed, colored, composed, everythinged! What are you eating for breakfast?

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  15. Sam, those are terrific! excellent work!

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  16. Fantastic stuff! Your work is inspiring.

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  17. These are just amazing. Seriously, amazing. Some of my favs of your work for sure. It helps that I have a thing for penny farthings.

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  18. ya craazy! ur work is soooooo cool. clap, clap clap.

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  19. amzing work, again !
    like brun said, colors and composition are awesome !

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