Forty Years of Slipstream

When Cycle World readers sit down to enjoy their latest issues, one of the first things most of them turn to is Slipstream. And they've been doing so now for more than four decades.

Slipstream made its debut in the January, 1968, issue, replacing the rough-sketch cartoons that had run periodically during the previous year or so. The idea of an unusual last-page photograph accompanied by a humorous—and often off-the-wall—caption immediately proved to be a reader favorite, so it became a semi-regular feature of the magazine.

Throughout the rest of the '60s and '70s, most issues contained a Slipstream; but it wasn't until the mid-1980s that this last-page "closer" became a monthly necessity. And it was the November, 1981, Slipstream that introduced CW readers to "Ted," the infamous buffoon who has been misunderstanding, misassembling or mishandling all things motorcycle ever since.

We hate to see this humor go unappreciated by those of you who might not have seen most Slipstreams, so we are going to reproduce all of them—yes, all 40-plus-years' worth—here for your amusement, one year at a time. As you will see, the treatment and tone of Slipstream have changed somewhat over the years, but the central message remains the same: As motorcyclists, we should never take ourselves too seriously.