We have spent much time in fruitless and weary researches over old
French books and musty journals, and have found that there is but very
little about the Velocipede, in the literature, or dictionaries and
encyclopedias of ancient or modern times.
In the “Journal de Paris” of July 27, 1779, there is a description of
a vehicle invented by Messrs. Blanchard and Mesurier, the former the
celebrated aeronaut, which was exhibited on the Place Louis XV., named
to-day Place de Concorde, in the presence of many members of the French
Academy and a large concourse of spectators. At the head of the machine
was the figure of an eagle, with outspread wings, to which was attached
the apparatus with which the driver directed its movements. Behind it
was seated an individual who propelled the machine. At a subsequent
date, the inventor transported the vehicle to Versailles, and exhibited
its capabilities, in the presence of Louis XVI., Marie Antoinette, and
their effeminate court. At a later date M. Dreuze made an improvement
on this invention, which met with some success as a toy. A number of
these machines were constructed after his model, and distributed among
country postmen, who used the novelty for a time, until a heavy fall of
snow rendered them unserviceable, when they were abandoned, greatly to
the gratification of a conservative class, who, detesting anything in
the way of innovation, had prophesied their failure.
The article upon the Velocipede in the “American Encyclopedia,”
commences by giving the well-known derivation of the word from the
Latin _velox_, swift, and _pes_, a foot, and defines it as a carriage,
by means of which the rider propels himself along the ground, and
states that it was invented at Manheim.
In a little old French book called “Dictionnaire de Conversation,”
under the word _Velocipede_, we are referred to the word _Drasienne_,
on turning to which, we find a description of the three-wheeled arm
movement Velocipede, and the credit of its invention ascribed to Baron
Charles Drais de Saverbrun, at Manheim, at the early commencement of
the nineteenth century. The Drasienne, though a decidedly crude idea,
differed very materially from the clumsy structure of Messrs. Blanchard
and Mesurier.
Baron Drais de Saverbrun seems to be universally considered the
inventor of the germ, which has developed into the present improved
Velocipede. He was a man of considerable scientific attainments, and
author of several works; son of a lawyer, himself a landscape gardener;
and died at Carlsruhe, December 12, 1851. He was master of the woods
and forests of the Grand Duke of Baden, and rode about upon the
Drasienne, while performing his official duties.
This invention made its _début_ in 1816, in the garden of Tivoli, which
was at that time the favorite resort of the _crême de la crême_ of
Parisian society. As originally constructed it appears to have been of
the most simple kind. It consisted of a bar five feet long, supported
at each end upon a single wheel, that designed for the front being
so arranged as to turn obliquely to the line of the carriage. The
rider sat astride the bar, and propelled the machine by the action of
the feet upon the ground. The motion was much like walking upon the
heels; as the feet were brought down flat, the heels were the first
to touch. The vehicle was never generally patronized, because the
pleasure of riding it was counterbalanced by the labor of propelling
it. It was called the “Célérifère,” or “makespeed,” and many shafts
of ridicule were leveled mercilessly at it. The mode of propelling
it was not graceful, and this ridicule was not without foundation.
It disappeared from view in France almost as rapidly as its inventor
expected it to roll into public favor. This novel vehicle, under the
name of “Drasina” was introduced into England in 1818, and, at first,
the greatest possible expectations were created, with regard to its
usefulness and speed. It was maintained, that it would travel up-hill
on a post-road as fast as a man could walk; that on a level, even after
a heavy rain, it would average six or seven miles an hour; and that, on
a descent, it would equal a horse at full speed. It was described in
the advertisements of the day as “consisting of two wheels, one behind
the other, connected by a perch, on which a saddle is placed as a seat.
The front wheel is made to turn on a pivot, guided by a circular lever
or rudder, which comes up to the hand; _the fore-arms rest on a cushion
in front_; in this position, both hands holding the rudder firmly, the
machine and traveller are preserved _in equilibrio_.”
In 1821 Lewis Gompertz of Surrey, introduced some decided improvements
upon the Drasina, as will be seen from the accompanying engraving,
extracted from the 39th volume of the English “Repertory of Arts.”
[Illustration]
The object of the improvement of Gompertz was to bring the arms of
the rider into action, in assistance to his legs. It consisted “in
the application of a handle, C, which is to be worked backwards and
forwards, to which is attached a circular rack, D G, which works in
a pinion, E, with ratch wheel on the front wheel of the velocipede,
and which, on being pulled by the rider with both hands, sends the
machine forward; and when thrust from him does not send it back again,
on account of the ratch, which allows the pinion to turn in that
direction, free of the wheel. H is the saddle, and the rest, B is so
made that the breast of the rider bears against it, while the sides
come around him at some distance below the arms, and is stuffed.” The
rider could with this machine either propel it entirely without the
feet, or he could use the feet, while the arms were free. The beam, A,
was made of beech wood, and a pivot at F, allowed the front wheel to be
turned to the right or left at the will of the rider. This must have
been, although somewhat clumsily shaped, quite an efficient machine,
good for the times--forty-eight years ago. It will be seen that it
has many features in common with the one now in vogue, though the
difference in the manner of propelling completely changes the character
of the vehicle.
Among those who distinguished themselves on the velocipede in England
was Michael Faraday the chemist, who frequently drove his machine
through the suburbs of London.
The velocipede was cultivated most assiduously for some little time
by the sporting gentry of England; but Lord George Bentinck and other
persons of fashion finally pronounced so decidedly against it, that
it descended to the vulgar level of a plaything for young people, and
ceased to be regarded in any other light than that of a toy or hobby.
While the fever lasted, a shoemaker of London made much money by the
manufacture of a strong shoe, soled with iron, which greatly aided the
feet of the “Velocipeders,” as they went over the ground.
William Howitt, in his “Visits to Remarkable Places,” a book published
in 1841, makes mention of the velocipede as follows--the passage
is taken from a description of Alnwick Castle, the ancient seat of
the Percy family: “Among the curiosities laid up here, are also two
velocipedes, machines which twenty years ago were for a short period
much in vogue. One young man of my acquaintance rode on one of these
wooden horses all the way from London to Falkirk in Scotland, and was
requested at various towns to exhibit his management of it to the
ladies and gentlemen of the place. He afterward made a long excursion
to France upon it. He was a very adroit velocipedean, and was very
much amused with the circumstance of a gentleman meeting him by the
river side, who, requesting to be allowed to try it, and being shown
how he must turn the handle in order to guide it, set off with great
spirit, but turning the wrong way, soon found himself hurrying to the
edge of the river, where in his flurry, instead of turning the handle
the other way, he began lustily shouting ‘Woh!’ ‘woh!’ and so crying
plunged headlong into the stream. The Duke’s horse, which is laid up
here for the gratification of posterity, was, I believe, not so unruly;
yet I was told its pranks caused it to be disused and here stabled.
It is said that the duke and his physicians used to amuse themselves
with careering about the grounds on these steeds; but one day being
somewhere on the terrace, his grace’s Trojan steed capsized, and rolled
over and over with him down the green bank, much to the amusement of
a troop of urchins who were mounted on a wall by the road to witness
this novel kind of racing. On this accident the velocipede was laid up
in lavender, and a fine specimen of the breed it is. I asked the old
porter if the story was true, but he only said, ‘Mind! I did not tell
you that. Don’t pretend to say, if you write any account of this place,
that you had that from me.’”
The machine was introduced into New York in 1819, where it was given
the English name of “Hobby-horse” or “Dandy-horse.” The excitable
citizens went into an ecstasy of astonishment and delight, and the
manufacturers found it impossible to meet the demand. A place was
opened for their exhibition near Bowling Green, and people used
to run on them up and down the Bowery, and the hill that led from
Chatham Street to the City Hall Park. The rage for them soon extended
throughout the country; and we hear of them in Philadelphia, Yonkers,
Troy, Saratoga, and Boston. At Troy in the fall of 1819, a firm, Davis
and Rogers, manufactured a number of machines, and used to let them to
the young bloods about town, at twenty-five cents an hour. In Boston
they became quite common, and, moonlight nights, students from the
classic shades of Old Harvard could be seen running them across the
long bridge into the city.
In a New York paper of those days we find an interesting account of a
newly invented velocipede for ladies then building “by a distinguished
artist.” “It is to have beams, or bodies on springs, and four wheels
which will insure its safety. It is to quarter on the road like other
carriages; and with four _impellers_ it is supposed it will proceed
with astonishing rapidity; but its peculiar recommendation is to be
conveyance of two ladies and two _impellers_ at the rate of six miles
an hour.”
The “Ladies Literary Cabinet” (published corner Chatham and Duane
streets), of Saturday, August 9, 1819, gives a very amusing account
of a hoax which seems to have completely deceived the citizens:
“VELOCIPEDE HOAX. Some mischievous wag on Saturday last, caused printed
hand-bills to be distributed, announcing that on Monday at five o’clock
precisely, a velocipede would start from the head of Chatham Square,
and proceed to St. Paul’s Church in less than two minutes, and that it
would afterward be exhibited in the Park, etc. Notwithstanding the rain
on Monday, the people began to collect at an early hour, so that before
five o’clock Chatham Street was literally crowded from one end to the
other. Every window from the basement to the attic was thrown open, and
filled with the beautiful heads of ladies and children, exposed to the
incessant searching mist, which robbed their lovely tresses of every
curl which the morning’s industry had created. But female fortitude
and curiosity combined, are not to be shaken by wind and weather. For
more than an hour did the throng continue to increase, until it was
almost impossible to pass the street with or without a velocipede. In
the mean time, the Park was also crowded, and the City Hall exhibited
the appearance of a gala-day. It is needless to say that no velocipede
appeared.”
Since that time down to a recent day, when M. Lallement, of France,
took it in hand, all experiments to render the machine subservient
to practical purposes appear to have been unsatisfactory, and it has
only been used as a toy, with the modification of a third wheel. M.
Lallement succeeded in affixing to the front wheel of the two-wheeled
machine, treadles which should be acted upon by the feet. His success
attending his endeavors to ride it, was beyond his most sanguine
expectations. After becoming a thorough master of the tandem team,
he appeared upon the Champs Elysées, and created a genuine _furore_.
People not only wondered that such a strange machine should run so
swiftly, but that it should run at all upon two wheels in a line. He
obtained a patent upon his velocipede, and sold it to Messrs. Michaux &
Co., of Paris, who have since improved much upon it. M. Lallement, with
James Carroll, of New Haven, Conn., obtained a patent in this country
in 1866.
The machines now in use are so radically different from those of fifty
years ago, so perfect in propelling power, so easy to ride, so swift of
motion, so useful as a means of conveyance, that it seems impossible
for history to repeat itself with regard to the present mania.
[Illustration]