Sterling Bicycle Co.

Sterling Cycle Works began producing bicycles in Chicago in 1894 and quickly built a national profile with its 'Built Like a Watch' advertising. The company supplied Annie Londonderry with the lightweight men's Sterling she used for much of her publicised round-the-world journey and later offered roadsters, racers, tandems, women's safety bicycles, and an unusual shaft-drive chainless model. Sterling moved production to a large single-storey factory in Kenosha during the mid-1890s, earned a silver medal at the 1898 Trans-Mississippi Exposition, and entered the American Bicycle Company combination in 1899. The Kenosha plant closed in 1900 and was sold to Thomas B. Jeffery for early Rambler automobile production; Westfield later retained the Sterling name and trademark.