The modern bicycle took shape in 1885, when the English inventor John Kemp Starley produced the Rover Safety Bicycle in Coventry, with two wheels of equal size and a chain driving the rear wheel. It was much safer than the high-wheeled penny-farthing, which had been popular in the 1870s and 1880s but was prone to dangerous falls. The earliest ancestor was the dandy horse, invented by the German Karl Drais in 1817, which riders pushed along with their feet, and pedals were added to the front wheel in France in the 1860s. In 1888 John Boyd Dunlop's pneumatic tyre made riding far smoother. The safety bicycle spread rapidly in the 1890s, offering cheap personal transport and, especially for women, a new sense of independence.
Before and after
- 11 October 1884Birth of Eleanor Roosevelt
- from 31 October 1884 to 9 November 1884Chichibu Incident
- from 15 November 1884 to 26 February 1885Berlin Conference
- 30 December 1884Birth of Hideki Tojo
- 1885Bicycle
- 1885Discovery of neodymium
- from 1885 to 1919German East Africa
- 1885The Potato Eaters
- 1885Construction of Washington Monument
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The era
This moment belongs to the Industrial era (1760 CE to 1914 CE), steam, factories and revolutions. You can also browse everything in the 19th century.