Evans Cycles
Evans Cycles is a large British cycle retailer. It was opened in central London by a London cyclist, Frederick Evans, who won an award from Britain's largest cycling club for the best cycling invention of 1925. He left his shop to be run by his manager and joined the Royal Air Force when war broke out in 1939. He died in a road accident in 1944 and the shop and the national business that developed from it has had several owners. It is owned now by ECI Partners.
The history
The business was created by a London cyclist, Frederick W. Evans. He created what The Bicycle described as a quick-release and reversible rear wheel device, an ingenious feat for which he was awarded the Cyclists' Touring Club's first silver plaque as the inventor or producer of the greatest improvement in cycle design, construction or equipment during the year 1925.
Evans opened a shop in Kennington Road in south east London, known as F.W. Evans Cycles. With the outbreak of war in 1939 he joined the Royal Air Force and left the business in charge of his manager. The shop traded from this site for 30 years. Evans died in a road accident in 1944, having never again run his shop. He was by then in the educational engineering branch of the RAF.