Haven of love

Mark Pace owns a fire station full of bike parts. Frames hang from the ceiling, and gears are tacked on the walls. A fire pole stands on the floor amid dismembered bicycles of varying sizes and shapes. 

Pace Bicycle Haven began in 1979. In 2000, Pace bought a fire station near downtown Independence. The station now doubles as a home and workplace. Upstairs in a remodled two-bedroom apartment live the five Paces, a dog and a cat. Downstairs are the bikes.

A 15-passenger van is parked outside. It is the one vehicle large enough to transport the family’s four-seater bike.

The Paces are a cycling family. Kathy Pace was a biker even before she met Mark. When her bike needed tuning up, a friend recommended she take it to Pace Bicycle Haven. Mark told her he could fix her bike. He also told her it would be done more quickly if she would go for a ride on his tandem with him. 

A few bike rides later, the couple was engaged.

Owning a bike shop means the Paces get to meet many others who are just as passionate as they about cycling. 

“We get lots of repeat customers,” said Kathy. “They’ll come over and just sit here for an hour or two hours and chat. We trade reading material. Sometimes I give them tomatoes from my garden.”

“I’ve just met the most wonderful people,” added Mark. “Some cyclists are of a more liberal bent, and some of a more conservative bent, but they’re all just nicer than ordinary people. They’re more laid back.”

Mark enjoys the relaxed nature of his customers and the business in general.

“It’s very low key,” he said. “It’s a fun business, that’s why I was attracted to it.”

Mark formerly worked as a salesman, but didn’t enjoy it much.

“They basically wanted you to lie to people, and the hours were murderous”, he said.

Because he now works only during appointments, the Paces are able to live under a very flexible schedule. The children are homeschooled, and with the business below the home, the family is together much of the time. They eat together, learn together, and work together. Seven-year-old William and 11-year-old Mark Jr. help clean the shop and the bikes. Nineteen-year-old Sara often spent her summers assisting her father before she left to study creative writing at Beloit College in Wisconsin. Kathy is Mark’s administrative assistant. 

When not in the shop, the Paces spend a good deal of time in the library. Books are devoured by all five family members. In fact, it was through reading that Mark learned much of what he knows about bikes.

“I was mainly self-taught. I read every book I could get my hands on,” he said.

His customers agree that his self-teaching has proven extremely productive. 

“He is very knowledgeable,” said Deke Edwards, a St. Louis resident who visits the shop once or twice a year. “He can do almost anything. He enjoys a challenge, and I’ve brought him all sorts of challenges!”

Mark not only does tuneups, he also builds bikes made up of parts from everywhere imaginable. Parts from Italy and Holland and Japan may all find a home on Mark’s one-of-a-kind bicycle creations.   

“All of my bikes have very carefully mismatched parts,” said Mark.

His customers love this attention to detail.

“When Mark builds a bike every aspect is correct,” said John Porter, a weekly visitor to the shop.

Several customers have been loyal to the shop for more than 30 years.

“No one else ever touches my bike. If [Mark] tells me I need something I get it,” said Imogene Theisen.

Other customers, however, have never set foot in the shop or met the Paces. About a third of all Pace business is carried out over the Internet via e-bay. Mark ships parts all over the world to customers in Japan, England, Australia, Israel and the list goes on. He has found a large market for various bicycle parts he bought years back and has stored until the present.

“I have always bought things that I liked rather than things that were trendy,” he said. “And sometimes they turn out to be worth something.” 

Perhaps the same could be said of the lifestyle the Paces have chosen, a lifestyle which is anything but trendy. 

Handmade three-seater and four-seater bikes lean up against the white fire station walls, and in the back of the shop hangs a bike ready to be shipped off to South Korea. Mark focuses intently on his latest project, an upside down bike with its wheels in the air. Kathy is at his side. The children peek down through the trap door around the fire pole and a brown dog runs through the tomato garden.

“I hope I never have to grow up and get a real job,” says Mark, “I like this a lot.”



Pace Bicycle Haven is located at 1215 W Elm St. in Independence. To make an appointment with Mark Pace, call 816-461-7433 or e-mail him at pacebicycle@sbcglobal.net.