F-M Community Bike Workshop

A small and unassuming shop sits at the corner of First Avenue and University, surrounded by what looks like hundreds of bikes. A large paper sign, reading “F-M Community Bike Workshop,” hangs in the window. Step through the doors and you find yourself surrounded by a bustle of activity all around old bikes and parts, like stumbling on a bicycle graveyard.

This small room that the Community Bike Workshop calls home is filled with bikes of all types, sizes and mileages. Discarded wheels rest against rows of bikes, while the walls are covered with haphazardly organized parts. Bike frames hang close to the ceiling longing to be reunited with their parts and riders, and this is just what the volunteers at FMCBW would like to see.

The FMCBW is in fact far from a graveyard--the volunteers less like gravediggers and more like Frankenstein resurrecting old bikes from old parts. They hope to redistribute these bikes into the hands of people who can put them to good use once again. Their mission: “To promote the ideals of empowerment through self-reliance, sustainability, healthful living and anti-oppressive politics in the Fargo-Moorhead metropolitan area.”

Joining The Team

I first entered the workshop on a rainy Tuesday and was immediately introduced to Joe Curry, who has been with FMCBW since its beginning. Curry informed me that the shop was simply “chaos” but somehow still worked. He invited me to come back on a day when the rain would not be keeping people at home. The next Tuesday I would join the volunteers and witness the “chaos” first-hand.

The next Tuesday evening came and I headed for the workshop not knowing what to expect. I walked into the shop and Dan Gulya, a volunteer at the workshop, immediately asked me “What do you know about bikes?”

“Absolutely nothing.” Already I was off to a great start.

Sara Watson stepped in to set two other volunteers, recent MSUM graduates Anna and Ellie Musselman, and myself to work organizing most of the shop’s bikes. Ellie’s sharp eye for parts made us a great team. Anna and Ellie had both volunteered to earn a bike.

The FMCBW allows volunteers to earn shop credits with which to “purchase” a bike of their own. Watson, a member of the FMCBW collective, explained that each hour a volunteer works earns them ten points for the program. A second program, Earn a Bike, empowers community agencies, often homeless shelters and centers for new Americans, to refer a person to FMBCW to receive a bike.

As the night progressed, not only did my organizational skills sharpen but I began to feel truly a part of the community. The workshop was bringing together people from all different backgrounds simply to work on bikes.

While at the shop I met Charles Crews, a veteran who served 12 years of active duty with the Marines in Beirut and Desert Storm. He now lives in a tent. “I’ve learned to live out of dumpsters,” Crews said.

Crews had come to the shop to fix a bearing in his bike’s wheel. Seeing all the bikes outside, he entered the shop hoping it would be a place where he might find some help.

Crews, clad in military fatigues, took a break from his bike to talk to me and said that he now spends his time working with homeless veterans distributing old military supplies, such as clothing for them to wear. He said he’d recently discovered that he was owed several thousand dollars in back pay for his pension, and went on to tell me that he was looking for charities he could donate some of that money to.

Near the end of the evening Crews had finished work on his bike and approached Curry, placing a 10 dollar bill in his hand thanking him for the help.

Crews, however, was actually one of the few who came in with his own bike. Josh Lake, entered the shop when it opened at 5 pm after waiting outside for “hours”. Lake’s friend had told him about the shop and he decided to check it out. “I walk everywhere, I usually prefer walking but I think I am moving up in the world,” Lake said while attempting to chose between a bright blue Schwinn and a multicolored Huffy. Lake chose the Huffy.

Like all FMCBW bike recipients, after choosing his bike Lake began the task of repairing the bike’s damage. Everyone that receives a bike from the workshop spends time getting their hands dirty learning what it takes to keep their bike in running order. The volunteers do not simply work on the bikes themselves but teach the recipient basic repair skills for the future. “I really enjoyed putting this bike together,” Lake said.

Yesterday and Tomorrow

The FMCBW started like most things, with a simple idea and receptive ears. Joe Curry and Andrew Bushaw started talking over the idea one day while in Nicole’s Fine Pastry, where Curry worked at the time.

“I was searching for something to do in the community,” Curry said, “It was time to seriously consider doing something important.” The idea took off from there and soon after a core group formed to make the idea a reality. Joe Curry and Andrew Bushaw were joined by Matt Staahl, Pete Morsch and Sara Watson. “It just kind of happened,” Watson said.

Curry himself came to the group with no experience. “ While I had always had a bike, I had never wrenched on it,” Curry said. Now, watching Curry in the shop it is obvious he can no longer say that. “My knowledge has increased a lot since I have been forced to learn it,” Curry said.

Since its beginning the FMCBW has aimed to be just a little radical. There is no true leader of the group, which calls itself a collective. “A collection of people with an equal say in how this organization is created and the direction it will go” Curry said.

The workshop itself attracts a diverse crowd, which is part of its appeal to both Curry and Watson. Watson has found friends in many of her fellow volunteers, “It’s heartwarming,” Watson said, “everyone has really stretched themselves.”

Curry recalls seeing a Muslim woman working alongside her son when a man who seemed uneasy around the two came in to the shop. “Seeing them interact was fantastic.”

He feels that the workshop has made great progress. “The community has already responded really positively and it is not as difficult as we thought.”

For Curry the best part has been working with the people and seeing those in need receive bikes. “The people who we wanted to help have through the grapevine found us.”

Curry believes the shop could be around for much longer if things keep going their way. “There are probably bikes just sitting in garages that could be donated.”

If You Go

What: F-M Community Bike Workshop
Where: Northwest corner of 1st Ave N & University
When: Tue, open shop, 5-9 p.m.; Wed., BMX night, 5-9 p.m.; 1st and 3rd Thursdays, volunteer only, 5-9 p.m.; 2nd and 4th Thursdays women’s night, 5-9 p.m.; Sun., open shop, 11 a.m.-5 p.m.
Info: (701) 478-4021, http://www.fmbikeworkshop.org