Ben PowellChattanooga has grown as a cycling community in recent years, and there are more bicycle shops and bike makers in this area than ever before to serve the growing number of riders.
But Ben Powell was around when the cycling craze was just starting to take off in the United States – and he’s still around to help some of his longtime customers when they need help ordering a part.
Powell, 86, is a World War II veteran who earned the Purple Heart after being wounded in Germany. The Chickamauga Ga., native opened a shop selling Vespa motor scooters in Fort Oglethorpe in 1980.
“The people in the Middle East clamped down on the oil (in the 1970s),” Powell recalls. “When that happened people were wanting something that was a whole lot cheaper on gas.
“The Vespa scooter had a superior motor,” Powell says. “After World War II, they took the motors used to help crank an airplane and put it in these scooters.”
After he began selling Vespas, Powell branched out to offer Bianchi bicycles manufactured by Piaggio, the same company that made the Vespa, and his shop became one of the first local places for cyclists to get the high-quality European bicycles.
Powell’s shop on U.S. Highway 27 is no longer actively selling new bikes, but he still opens the shop six days a week and can order tubes and parts for any of his old customers who need some help keeping their bicycles on the road.
“Since my wife died, I need something to do,” he says. “I don’t watch television and I need to get out of the house, so I come here.”