Albert John Fritz (October 8, 1924 – May 7, 2013) was a vice president at the

Schwinn Bicycle Company The Schwinn Bicycle Company is an American company that develops, manufactures and markets bicycles under the eponymous brand name. The company was originally founded by Ignaz Schwinn (1860–1948) in Chicago in 1895. It became the dominant manuf ...

and is credited with creating the Schwinn Sting-Ray, which started the

wheelie bike A wheelie bike, also called a dragster, muscle bike, high-riser, spyder bike or banana bike, is a type of stylized children's bicycle designed in the 1960s to resemble a chopper motorcycle and characterized by ape hanger handlebars, a ban ...

craze. Mr. Fritz was born in Chicago on October 8, 1924, and died on May 7, 2013, in Barrington, Illinois. He graduated from the 8th grade and then studied

stenography Shorthand is an abbreviated symbolic writing method that increases speed and brevity of writing as compared to longhand, a more common method of writing a language. The process of writing in shorthand is called stenography, from the Greek ''ste ...

. He joined the US Army and was on Gen. Douglas MacArthur's staff when he was wounded in the Philippines. He was awarded the Bronze Star for his role in the first advance team to land in the Philippines. He joined Schwinn in 1945 and worked initially as a grinder and a welder. He was vice president for engineering, research and development in 1962 when he launched the Sting-Ray. He retired from Schwinn in 1985 as head of Excelsior, Schwinn's exercise division. He was inducted into the BMX Hall of Fame in 2010.

References

1924 births 2013 deaths American manufacturing businesspeople Businesspeople from Chicago Cycle designers 20th-century American businesspeople United States Army personnel of World War II {{Design-bio-stub