BONE-SHAKER CYCLES

Evening Post, Volume CVII, Issue 102, 4 May 1929, Page 21

BONE-SHAKER CYCLES

EARLIER THAN "SPIDERS"

In 18S3 Lord Eirkcnhcad, who was born in 1572, learned to ride a boneshaker, as ho told tho Cyclist's Touring Club at a jubilee -banquet. Dr. Georgo A. Fothergiil recalls in "Chambers's Journal" his own experiences of that strange form of bicycle, and the later but now antiquated spider-wheel, also known as tho penny-farthing becauseof its large and small wheels. With the spider-wheel Lord Birkenhcad rode in a 10-niilo race, and afterwards on an excursion from Liverpool to Edinburgh. In 1874 a relative of Dr. Fothcrgill brought from tho Paris Exhibition a bone-shaker which had been shown in tlic class for velocipedes. It was a ! beautifully painted wooden bicycle costing 115 guineas. Tho main difncully with the bone-shaker was its brake It" tho hill wcro stoop and short, it was never full on till tho ride* reached the foot of tho hill or began to ascend the next one. It was a brake on tlio him! wheel, liko a carriage brake, and strangely worked by a string attached to tho.handlo-bar. Tho handles had to bo twisted round a dozen times bet'oro tho brake acted properly. Tho machine w:is practically out of control during tlio greater part of a short decline, and if tlio rider required to avoid somebody or something in front of him his only choice (for he could not dismount, in :i. hurry) was to turn tlio wherl suddenly at a. right angle- and collide with :i hedge, a bank, or a wall. Tho spider-wheel, in Dr. Kothergill's opinion, was a smooth-going and comfortable bicycle, even compared with tho bicycles of to-day. It was, however, dangerous to ride for those who had not mastered it, and women of those days could not uso it. (One has soon it ridden as :i trick machine on tlio stage by women in vaudeville entertainments.) In extracts from a diary kept in boyhood concerning tours on a. spider-wheel, Dr. Fothergill has this under 29th August, ISB2, with refcronce to a Scottish tour:—"Wont out to sco them play golf, tho national game of Scotland. Father bought a golf ball for a shilling, as a curiosity, mado of gutta pereha." In ]SS2, explains Dr. Fothergill, he believes there were only five golf courses in England; so that a golf ball, to many English people, was indeed a curiosity.