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This passage discusses the development of human-powered vehicles from the 1820s to 1850s. During this period, three- and four-wheeled vehicles were common and came in many designs using pedals, treadles, and hand-cranks. Some key reported inventions during this era include a Scottish blacksmith who may have built the first rear-wheel drive two-wheeler in 1839 and a similar machine produced in Scotland around 1845. The first documented producer of rod-driven two-wheel treadle bicycles was Thomas McCall in 1869.

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23 views

New Text Document

This passage discusses the development of human-powered vehicles from the 1820s to 1850s. During this period, three- and four-wheeled vehicles were common and came in many designs using pedals, treadles, and hand-cranks. Some key reported inventions during this era include a Scottish blacksmith who may have built the first rear-wheel drive two-wheeler in 1839 and a similar machine produced in Scotland around 1845. The first documented producer of rod-driven two-wheel treadle bicycles was Thomas McCall in 1869.

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latchanyanana
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© © All Rights Reserved
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1820s to 1850s: an era of 3 and 4-wheelers[edit]

A couple seated on an 1886 Coventry Rotary Quadracycle for two.


McCall's first (top) and improved velocipede of 1869 - later predated to 1839 an
d attributed to MacMillan
Though technically not part of two-wheel ("bicycle") history, the intervening de
cades of the 1820s-1850s witnessed many developments concerning human-powered ve
hicles often using technologies similar to the draisine, even if the idea of a w
orkable two-wheel design, requiring the rider to balance, had been dismissed. Th
ese new machines had three wheels (tricycles) or four (quadracycles) and came in
a very wide variety of designs, using pedals, treadles, and hand-cranks, but th
ese designs often suffered from high weight and high rolling resistance. However
, Willard Sawyer in Dover successfully manufactured a range of treadle-operated
4-wheel vehicles and exported them worldwide in the 1850s.[11]
1830s: the reported Scottish inventions[edit]
The first mechanically propelled two-wheel vehicle is believed by some to have b
een built by Kirkpatrick MacMillan, a Scottish blacksmith, in 1839. A nephew lat
er claimed that his uncle developed a rear-wheel drive design using mid-mounted
treadles connected by rods to a rear crank, similar to the transmission of a ste
am locomotive. Proponents associate him with the first recorded instance of a bi
cycling traffic offence, when a Glasgow newspaper reported in 1842 an accident i
n which an anonymous "gentleman from Dumfries-shire... bestride a velocipede...
of ingenious design" knocked over a pedestrian in the Gorbals and was fined five
British shillings. However, the evidence connecting this with MacMillan is weak
, since it is unlikely that the artisan MacMillan would have been termed a gentl
eman, nor is the report clear on how many wheels the vehicle had. The evidence i
s unclear, and may have been faked by his son.
A similar machine was said to have been produced by Gavin Dalzell of Lesmahagow,
circa 1845. There is no record of Dalzell ever having laid claim to inventing t
he machine. It is believed that he copied the idea having recognised the potenti
al to help him with his local drapery business and there is some evidence that h
e used the contraption to take his wares into the rural community around his hom
e. A replica still exists today in the Glasgow Museum of Transport. The exhibit
holds the honour of being the oldest bike in existence today.[11] The first docu
mented producer of rod-driven two-wheelers, treadle bicycles, was Thomas McCall,
of Kilmarnock in 1869. The design was inspired by the French front-crank veloci
pede of the Lallement/Michaux type.[11]

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