You can read the first part here
[…] At the 1899 World Championships at the Vélodrome de Queen's Park in Montreal , Canada, Taylor became the first African American athlete to win a world championship and was the second black athlete, after Canadian boxer George Dixon, to win the world title overall for any sport.
In late 1899, Taylor signed a contract to race with Iver Johnson's Arms & Cycle Works team of Fitchburg" Massachusetts, for the 1900 season. The 1900 season was also full of successes and records, with two U.S. championships and two new records in the half mile and 1/3 mile. At the end of the season he settled in Worchester and purchased a home.
In 1901 Taylor agreed to participate in a spring European tour, took part in 57 races and won 42. He was unable to win all the races because he still refused to compete on Sundays at that time for religious reasons and failed to participate in a handful of finals. Major Taylor was strongly Christian, always carried a Bible with him, and before each race he could be seen murmuring a prayer.
The 1901 season brought him worldwide fame, wherever he went he was mobbed by reporters and fans. European tours were repeated every year until 1904, flanked in '03 and '04 by small tours to Australia and New Zealand attracted by the prizes on offer.
During this four-year period of World Tours Taylor became filthy rich, earning up to $35,000 per season (the equivalent of about $1,000,000 today).
In 1904 during a race in Australia Taylor had an accident, fellow rider Iver Lawson voluntarily cut Taylor's path and collided with his front wheel. Taylor fell and was unconscious on the track several minutes before being taken to a local hospital, only later making a full recovery.
Lawson was suspended from racing anywhere in the world for one year because of his misdeeds. Taylor was accustomed to the behaviors of white cyclists, who resented being beaten by a black man. As mentioned earlier insults and beatings were the order of the day, in 1897 he was even throttled into unconsciousness at the end of a race in Massachusetts by the third place finisher of that race (one William Becker, $50 fine for those actions). At times he was targeted by the public who went so far as to sabotage him by throwing nails to make him drill.
Perhaps that fall in 1904 was the straw that broke the camel's back; our Major decided to take a break from racing of about 2 1/2 years.
He returned to racing in France in 1907 and immediately smashed a world record in the half-mile from a standing start with a time of 42''. He also returned to Europe in 1908 and 1909, where he finally decided to race on Sundays as well. His last European race was at the Roanne velodrome where he beat French world champion Charles Dupré. He raced the 1910 season in the States and then retired, at age 32, "tired of racism," he said....
Major Taylor became an example and inspiration to the African American community, encouraging them to overcome racial prejudice and discrimination. Despite the obstacles in his path he succeeded in becoming an athlete at the top of his sport and for his time was a dominant and accumulated a net worth of between $75,000 and $100,000 (between $2 million and $3 million today).
Due to bad investments in the midst of the '29 crisis and a failed marriage, he had to sell his property in Worchester to repay his debts; he also began to suffer serious health problems.
In 1932, at the age of 53, he suffered a heart attack that proved fatal. His wife and daughter did not immediately learn of so death, and since the body was not claimed Major Taylor ended his days in a mass grave near Chicago. It was not until 1948 that a group of former cyclists organized a fundraiser to exhume the body and bury him properly, with a plaque engraved where it reads, "World's champion bicycle racer who came up the hard way without hatred in his heart, an honest, courageous and God-fearing, clean-living gentlemanly athlete. A credit to his race who always gave out his best. Gone but not forgotten."( World cycling champion who rode the hard way without hatred in his heart, an honest, courageous and God-fearing, clean-living gentlemanly athlete. A hero to his race who always gave his best. He is gone but not forgotten).
Today a monument of him is displayed in front of the Worcester library, and the Indianapolis velodrome bears his name.
"Life is too short for any man to hold bitterness in his heart"-Marshall Taylor
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