I've just started reading Jon Lee Anderson's 1998 biography of Che Guevara, "Che Guevara:  A Revolutionary Life."  (http://search.barnesandnoble.com/booksearch/isbnInquiry.asp?z=y&endeca=1&isbn=0802135587&itm=4)  It's a good read thus far, though I'm early on in the book - he's in Guatemala right now, witness to the US government/United Fruit Company-sponsored coup against the democratically-elected Arbenz government there (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacobo_Arbenz_Guzm%C3%A1n).  His dislike of the United States is just developing - when you read some of details of US policy in that part of the world (though this book doesn't get into too many details), there's little wonder how that could happen!

What does any of this have to do with bicycles?  Well, check out the photo.  Lots of people know all about the popular movie from back in 2004, Motorcylce Diaries (http://libcom.org/news/article.php/review-motorcycle-diaries-che-guevara), which was about a trip Guevara made through Latin America by motorcycle with a friend.  That's in the book too.  But, prior to that trip, in 1948, he ventured off to remote Northern Argentina from the city on a bicycle equipped with a motor - the one he's sitting on in the photo.  Not quite a bicycle, but certainly not a motorcycle.  He put in a lot of pedaling on this thing, apparently - and a lot of road-side repairs.

- posted by Chris