The world’s first bicycle trip took place more than 200 years ago, in June 1817 in the city of Mannheim in present-day southwestern Germany.
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A local aristocrat, Baron Karl von Drais, publicly made the trip sitting on a wooden frame with two wheels and a seat.
K. von Drais managed to cover a distance of 14 kilometers in less than an hour with the new vehicle, which he called the “running machine” (“laufmaschine”).
K. von Drais constructed his vehicle out of wood. This vehicle did not yet have pedals; the “rider” moved forward by pushing off the ground with his feet.
However, the vehicle had a handlebar connected to the front wheel, as well as a special guardrail on which the “rider” could rest and relax his hands.
In 1818, K. von Drais patented his created vehicle under the name velocipede (“vélocipède”) in Paris.
In Germany, the vehicle began to be called a draisine after the inventor’s surname.
One of the reasons K. von Drais started creating the “running machine” was the desire to find a faster way of travel that would not depend on horses.
In 1815-1816, Europe experienced a very poor harvest, and tens of thousands of horses on the continent died of starvation or were slaughtered for meat and leather.
“During the war, when horses or their feed are often scarce, such vehicles can be useful to soldiers, especially for sending messages over short distances or transporting the wounded,” wrote K. von Drais.
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In 1820, the first bicycles appeared on the roads of Mannheim. They were heavy and difficult to control, so many riders preferred to travel on smoother pedestrian paths.
Due to frequent collisions with pedestrians, many municipalities around the world quickly took measures to ban or regulate the use of bicycles.
K. von Drais’s model had to be specially made for a specific rider, taking into account his height and stride length.
However, after a few years, an improved version of the vehicle with an adjustable height “saddle” appeared.
Neither K. von Drais’s model nor the vehicles created based on it in other countries became very popular.
They were expensive, their usability on uneven roads was very limited, and riders were often mocked by both passersby and caricaturists of the time, who derisively called the new vehicles “dandy horses.”
Only after several decades were the first bicycles similar to today’s with pedals and chains created, and their mass production began.