Handcar Regatta

Wired reports that the venerable bicycle turns 90 years old today (in a somewhat loose definition). The Great Handcar Regatta owes much to the Draisine and the many steadfast inventors who built upon each other’s discoveries, leading to the “bikes” we know and love today!

Around February 17, 1818, Baron Karl Christian Ludwig von Drais de Sauerbrun invented the first two-wheeled personal transport vehicle as an alternative to expensive and inconvenient horse travel.

Drais called his patented contraption the Laufmaschine or “running machine” as it had neither pedals nor brakes, forcing riders to use their feet for propulsion and stopping. Flimsy leather shoes of the day and virtually no smooth paved roads ruined any chance of the machine’s popular use.

However, aristocrats found the invention charming enough to buy and race with. Eventually the French, among others, adopted the steadily-improving bicycle, calling it the Draisine, a term that is still used today for human powered railcars.

For a quick tour of the bicycle’s humble beginnings, see the following slideshow from the Institute and Museum of the History of Science: Cycling Through Time

Analogous reports:

1. Free & Secure Valet Bicycle Parking Procured