| A few years ago, I spotted a black 21" Racing Paramount on eBay with a fairly low "Buy-it-Now" price. I gave it some consideration, and after about an hour or so I returned, ready to purchase. It was gone! That started my quest for a similar Paramount, the dream bike of my youth. It wasn't until about a year later that I spotted the white '74 shown elsewhere in this site, a bike that has given me great pleasure. Recently, a 21" Campus Green 1972 P13 in mint condition came up for sale, and I bid on it. The person who won the auction backed out of the deal and the seller offered it to me at my highest bid price. Campus Green is an odd, uniquely Schwinn color, and was the shade of my first 10-speed, a late '60s Varsity. I think the Paramount and the PeaPicker Krate Stingray were the only models the color looked good on (it's the contrast with the chrome that makes it work at all). Still, it wouldn't have been my first choice for the color of another bike in my cramped house, so I politely passed. The seller relisted the bike and sold it for several hundred dollars more than my offer!
Many months later, another almost identical bike came up for sale, again with a low instant purchase offer. This time, I snapped it up immediately. It is not quite as pristine as the one I passed up, but it was a lot less money and what are the chances of there being another bike like this in my size that has gone basically unridden in over 30 years? My first racing bike was a '72 P13 in black that was too big for me. Perhaps this is the bike that I should have purchased back then. At least I can enjoy it now!
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