After posting my grandmother’s photo album on my blog, I have been approached by a few people with some great advice to assist with identifying the other riders in the album and the route they possibly took crossing the Sierra Nevada Range out of Yosemite. So here’s some additional information that I recently received.

My grandmother’s female riding companion was Frankie Davis Palin. Frankie, according to her great niece, was a “wild one”. She was the relative no one talked about but everyone thought about and when she visited she was laden with gifts for all. She married Ronald Palin in 1913 and lived in San Mateo as of 1920. Ronald owned a bicycle shop, the one pictured in the photograph. Details are not yet clear as to the years the shop was owned and active, but as of 1918, the time of this motorcycle journey, Ronald Palin was likely the owner. He also designed a shock for a rear motorcycle seat in 1912 according to a patent unearthed via Google patents. I was informed that he is pictured in the photograph with Frankie in front of the bicycle shop in San Mateo. Ronald had a brother, Frank, who possibly is the other gentleman in this series of photographs, but as of today I am unsure.

Click pix for larger image…

I believe this photograph showing Frankie in a vaudeville show, and the one I have in my grandmother’s photo album, show undoubted similarities. I believe that is definitely the Frankie, whose relatives contacted me with the information I’m adding here. Frankie was either divorced from Ronald or widowed and she remarried to someone named Lemkau. Frankie died in 1954 in Alameda, CA at age 57.

Frankie on the left…

I will keep the investigation going in the hopes that eventually I’ll have more info to share! Some of the area maps of the time can be found here. I am attempting to re-create the route to ride this season.