Check out Cannondale’s first-ever bike: the ST-500 from 1983

That book says, “The undisputed founder of Cannondale bikes is Joe ‘son-of-a-glove-maker’ Montgomery. Though Joe started the company with three other partners, Cannondale would simply not be around without him.

1974 Joe Montgomery (credit: Cannondale)

“It wasn’t Joe’s tangible skills that forged Cannondale into a bike company. It was his values, his mindset, his brash approach. One that was equal parts relentless and driven. Relentless on notions such as compromise or giving up. And driven in his conviction to be able to fix blinders into business realities.

“While it’s true to say that Joe wasn’t Cannondale, equally, Cannondale wouldn’t be Cannondale without Joe.”

Cannondale’s first bicycle was the ST-500 touring bike, launched in 1983, which was revolutionary for its time due to its oversized, TIG-welded aluminium frame, designed to be lighter and stiffer than the steel frames common at the time.

As an aside, the USA’s other big bike brands cut their teeth with touring bikes too. Trek’s first bikes were hand-built, steel touring frames made in a small barn in Waterloo, Wisconsin, starting in 1976, while Specialized’s first bikes, introduced in 1981, included the Sequoia sport-touring model (along with the Allez road bike). All three soon became big in mountain biking, of course.

Cannondale was already making trailers and bags, but the ST-500 marked its entry into bicycle manufacturing and established its reputation for innovative aluminium frames. The concept of a bike made from aluminium was new to touring cyclists.

1983 Cannondale painting (credit: Cannondale)

Back to Cannondale’s 2021 book: “It’s hard to imagine a bigger gamble than the bold decision to use thin-walled oversized aluminium tubing for the original Cannondale bicycle framesets. Even when relatively thick, aluminium is a massive challenge to work with. But Cannondale was using such delicate tubing that if you were to press on both sides of the largest frame tube with your thumbs, you almost felt it give a little – like a soda can would.

“Of course, it made for a super light, super stiff, super performing bike, but it was notoriously difficult to weld without burning holes in the material. It had to be done by hand. So an in-house training program was put in place to get the welders specifically skilled for this job.

1984 Cannondale first road bike (credit: Cannondale)

“The heat from welding would also cause the frame to come out of critical alignment. While this is completely normal in frame building with all types and gauges of metal for Cannondale, the process to realign was also problematic due to the tubing sensitivities.

“Looking back, the degree of reinvention required across the entire manufacturing process was mind-boggling. The engineers had to redesign frame jigs, entirely reimagine the heat treatment process, devise a different realignment technique and invent a totally different way to cut and mitre the tubes so that they fit together more precisely.”

I’ve owned Cannondale bikes since, but not back then. I’m not sure when I was first aware of Cannondale, but it would have been sometime in the mid-eighties. Even without owning one, the things you knew about Cannondales were that the tubes were aluminium and, by 1980s steel standards, massive. They must have been really heavy, then? Nope.

Big metal bike tubes that were also lightweight – that was a foreign concept in the 1980s. Don’t get me wrong, we were used to some big ideas back then – we had Margaret Thatcher, the Rubik’s Cube, and Bananarama – but this was too much to handle. It blew our minds.

At that time, all Cannondale bikes were made in Bedford, Pennsylvania.

Back in a mid-1980s catalogue, Cannondale said, “We could have compromised by joining our tubing using the ‘screwed and glued’ method that some of our competitors employ. But we knew that welding and heat treating our tubing would make the frame a single unit without the flexible links that plague frames made with adhesives. That’s why we pioneered our exclusive welding and heat-treating process.

“We could have compromised by leaving the welds unfinished. That would have saved time and money, but our frames wouldn’t have the smooth, sleek handcrafted look you might not have expected from Cannondale. So we hired frame finishers to meticulously sand every weld on every bike.”

Oh yeah! Cannondale started to smooth their welds, and they looked otherworldly back then.

Although the ST-500 was a touring bike, it established Cannondale’s reputation for lightweight, stiff aluminium frames and paved the way for the brand’s success in road and mountain biking. Indeed, Cannondale entered the mountain bike market the following year with the SM-500, which was priced at $595.

1987 Cannondale catalogue shoes (credit: Catalogue)

Cannondale was diversifying. We have a 1987 Cannondale catalogue here that features the brand’s road shoes with “adjustable cleats for proper foot positioning.” They were also “compatible with the new Look clipless pedal system.”

1987 Cannondale Bugger 4 (credit: Catalogue)

Oh, and by 1987 Cannondale was up to the fourth generation of its Bugger bicycle trailer.

1988 Cannondale ad (credit: Cannondale)

Joe Montgomery came up with the idea of the Bugger after a bike trip with his son. Others worked on the development while Joe sourced various components and oversaw manufacturing, and the product was introduced way back in 1971. The company grew from there in the cycling market.

1997 Joe Montgomery with DH Bike & First Carbon Frame Project (credit: Cannondale)

Joe Montgomery left Cannondale years ago, but he played a big part in shaping the bike world that we know today.

Check out loads more Bikes at Bedtime here.