Invention of the Bicycle and Cycling

Bicycles nowadays are taken for granted, but they have not always been around. Here we take a look at the development of the bicycle and the popularity of cycling.

In almost every home in the world there is a bicycle. I am sure we can all remember our very first bicycle, and how we learned to cycle.

My own first bicycle was green, and I still remember the day my father took me to the park to hold on to the back of my bicycle so that I could cycle along the footpath. Suddenly I realised that Dad was not running along beside me! I was cycling alone. Oh the joy, I had finally managed to ride my lovely green bicycle. I was SO happy, I fell off! But as they say once you know how to ride a bicycle, this skill never leaves you, so back I got on my bicycle, to ride home to tell my mother what I had achieved. It was a wonderful day.

Most children own a bicycle, it gives them a taste of independence. As they get older they can cycle to visit their friends and to school, thus relieving their parents of the job of taxi driver.

In fact bicycles only appeared about 170 years ago. The very first bicycle was, invented less than a mile from the park in S W Scotland, where I learned to cycle.

It was a cumbersome thing weighing around 57 pounds, made of wood with iron wheel rims.

What do hobby horses and bicycles have in common?

In the 19th century hobby horses were very popular toys. A Blacksmith, Kirkpatrick Macmillan, observed a child playing on a hobby horse, and resolved to make one for himself. He considered the effort involved in making this move along, and came up with the idea of adding pedals to move the back wheel. This evolved into the prototype of the first bicycle.

He became a familiar sight riding his bicycle along the rutted country roads of S W Scotland. Gaining in confidence he went on a journey of over 60 miles to Glasgow which took him 2 days. Upon arrival there, he ran over a child and became the first person to be fined (five shillings) for speeding. It is believed that

the local magistrate asked Macmillan to give him a demonstration of the bicycle in the yard of the court. He was able to demonstrate the agility of the machine by performing a perfect figure of eight manoeuvre. So impressed was the magistrate that he decided to give him the five shillings required to pay the fine.

Kirkpatrick Macmillan never profited financially, from the invention of the bicycle, as he never patented his design. It was left to others to develop. However when one considers there are twice as many bicycles as cars in the world, and Scots such as Graham Obree, Chris Hoy, and Mark Beaumont have proved themselves world famous champion cyclists, it is left to the reader to ponder the inventor of the bicycle's legacy as more enduring, inspirational and preferrable.