5fish
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You know the bike was around during our civil war in different form but still a bicycle. Like I say, if the confederacy spend a little money on R & D they could have had Bicycle infantry like ones in World War One... They would have move faster than regular infantry. Remember Forrest rule of act: "Get there first with the most men." The bicycle could have done it with ease... Think of Gen. Stuart leading thousand of bikes into battle... or Gen. Gordon leading his regiment of bikes into battle...
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Snip... A German Baron gets credit for the first bike...
On 12 June 1817, a crowd gathered along the best road in Mannheim, Germany to watch Baron Karl von Drais demonstrate his newest invention: the 'draisienne', a two-wheeled horseless vehicle propelled by its rider. Drais climbed on and set out for the Schwetzinger switch house, a strategic point along the postal route. Less than an hour later, he was back, having completed the 8-9 mile round trip in a quarter of the usual time. Two hundred years later, we salute Drais and his draisienne as a significant milestone on the long road of innovation leading to the bicycle of today.
Snip... the German uprising of 1848...
Johnson’s 'pedestrian curricle', patent #4321 dated 22 December 1818, was an improved draisienne. It was lighter, substituted metal for wood where possible, had larger more stable wooden wheels lined with iron, featured a crossbar dipped in the middle where the saddle sat, was more upright, and had a metal steering column. It could travel 9-10 miles per hour, making it one of the fastest vehicles on the road. Johnson introduced a ladies drop frame and a deluxe model hand painted to order.
A riding school opened near his Long Acre shop, and races were organised. The 'dandy horse' or 'hobby' as it became known was popular with young urban gentlemen, and even more popular with satirists. 'The Hobby-Horse Dealer', an 1819 print held in the British Museum (below), which compares buying a velocipede to assessing a horse, illustrates this vein of humour.
Drais’s original draisienne may have been a passing fad, but his design inspired further innovation, copycats included, with lasting influence.
snip...
During the German Revolutions, 1848-9, Drais forfeited his title as Baron, becoming “Citizen Karl Drais.” Later, when Prussians forces reclaimed the region, revolutionary sympathisers were executed or committed to asylums, a fate Drais escaped only through the lobbying of his sister and cousin. Drais lived out his remaining years quietly and impoverished, having had his assets seized and reputation ruined in the aftermath of the failed revolution. He died penniless aged 66 on 10 December 1851. Drais’s inventions, his biographers reveal on www.karldrais.de, were forgotten or belittled by Baderian authorities keen on discrediting their political enemies.
Drais’s reputation was not restored until the Victorian cycling age. A commemorative plaque was installed on his house in Karlsruhe and German cyclists saw that his grave was protected. The Graphic, 4 May 1891 reported that “British Cyclists, who owe so much health and enjoyment to their machines, may like to hear of the honours just paid to the inventor of the bicycle, Baron Carl von Drais. [sic]…the Baron’s remains have been moved with much pomp from their neglected grave to a resting place in the new cemetery, where the bicyclists of the fatherland will erect a handsome monument.”
200 years since the father of the bicycle Baron Karl von Drais invented the 'running machine' | Cycling UK
On 12 June 1817, a crowd gathered along the best road in Mannheim, Germany to watch Baron Karl von Drais demonstrate his newest invention: the 'draisienne', a two-wheeled horseless vehicle propelled by its rider. Drais climbed on and set out for the Schwetzinger switch house, a strategic point...
www.cyclinguk.org
Snip... A German Baron gets credit for the first bike...
On 12 June 1817, a crowd gathered along the best road in Mannheim, Germany to watch Baron Karl von Drais demonstrate his newest invention: the 'draisienne', a two-wheeled horseless vehicle propelled by its rider. Drais climbed on and set out for the Schwetzinger switch house, a strategic point along the postal route. Less than an hour later, he was back, having completed the 8-9 mile round trip in a quarter of the usual time. Two hundred years later, we salute Drais and his draisienne as a significant milestone on the long road of innovation leading to the bicycle of today.
Snip... the German uprising of 1848...
Johnson’s 'pedestrian curricle', patent #4321 dated 22 December 1818, was an improved draisienne. It was lighter, substituted metal for wood where possible, had larger more stable wooden wheels lined with iron, featured a crossbar dipped in the middle where the saddle sat, was more upright, and had a metal steering column. It could travel 9-10 miles per hour, making it one of the fastest vehicles on the road. Johnson introduced a ladies drop frame and a deluxe model hand painted to order.
A riding school opened near his Long Acre shop, and races were organised. The 'dandy horse' or 'hobby' as it became known was popular with young urban gentlemen, and even more popular with satirists. 'The Hobby-Horse Dealer', an 1819 print held in the British Museum (below), which compares buying a velocipede to assessing a horse, illustrates this vein of humour.
Drais’s original draisienne may have been a passing fad, but his design inspired further innovation, copycats included, with lasting influence.
snip...
During the German Revolutions, 1848-9, Drais forfeited his title as Baron, becoming “Citizen Karl Drais.” Later, when Prussians forces reclaimed the region, revolutionary sympathisers were executed or committed to asylums, a fate Drais escaped only through the lobbying of his sister and cousin. Drais lived out his remaining years quietly and impoverished, having had his assets seized and reputation ruined in the aftermath of the failed revolution. He died penniless aged 66 on 10 December 1851. Drais’s inventions, his biographers reveal on www.karldrais.de, were forgotten or belittled by Baderian authorities keen on discrediting their political enemies.
Drais’s reputation was not restored until the Victorian cycling age. A commemorative plaque was installed on his house in Karlsruhe and German cyclists saw that his grave was protected. The Graphic, 4 May 1891 reported that “British Cyclists, who owe so much health and enjoyment to their machines, may like to hear of the honours just paid to the inventor of the bicycle, Baron Carl von Drais. [sic]…the Baron’s remains have been moved with much pomp from their neglected grave to a resting place in the new cemetery, where the bicyclists of the fatherland will erect a handsome monument.”