Fantastic Contrivances of Massive and Unneeded Difficulty--Bikes in War, 1897

ITEM:  cover from Scientific American Supplement, June 26, 1897.  14x10 inches.  $125.00

ref: JF Ptak Science Books   Post 1345

  

When I see images like this, I can feel a symphony of bad ideas rattling  my bones.

Of contrivances great and unnecessary,  that of bringing the bicycle into the field of war--banking on a fabulous interest in the machine and riding a wave of enthusiasms enjoyed by millions--is among the loftiest of lofty unnecessaries of the past 150 years or so. When these pictures were published in 1897 interest in the bicycle was shattering; it was a popular conveyance, and then in just two or three years, an explosion:  millions of people suddenly needed one.  Bikes seemed to be everywhere,  which forced people to imagine new and different uses for the machine.  And so the Austrian army came up with a plan to include the bike in its plans of war, and it proved to be as about as useful as a double-decker horse.  And just like that--poof--the fragility of the bike's expansive uses fell right off the table, along with the popular interest in it, which by the turn of the century saw the millions who had turned towards the bike turn away. 

It is difficult to image a more unpleasant (real) use for the bike than this.  The pictures seem as though they are part of a Monty Python montage, but they were indeed deadly serious--though I do need to credit someone, anyone, who came up with the idea of a folding bike to make it slightly more transportable.  (Overall though it seems almost as useful as a folding tuba.  Or sousaphone.)  If employed I think the idea would've proved to be more deadly to the biker than whomever the biker was attacking.  Or, more likely, fleeing.

One can only shudder and what it must've been like, sitting on top of that fence, handing bikes (with lights and horns) from one side to the other, bullets flying, attempting an attack with 75 pounds of cumbersome trouble slapped to your side.  It must have felt insane.

   

I think these men would have heard the music too as they slogged their ways through brush and trees and muck and the like, sliding their bikes along that log to keep them dry while the men stood in the wet. They would've heard the music too, a short little symphony played on folded instruments, which sounded as bad as it looked.

Comments

[Jonathan Daggar]

This seems to me only marginally more absurd than the practice of warfare in general. Moving into a field of flying bullets is the insanity; whether it be on two feet or two wheels is a minor detail.

That said, both sides used large numbers of bicycles for infintry transport up through world war 2. "D-Day" by Stephen Ambrose details how American soldiers would ditch the bicycles brought to the beaches in favor of captured German models.

[Bert, folding biker]

I love those pictures. I did not realize they had Photoshop back then, the guy riding up the 45 degree incline doesn't look sweaty at all

Bert

[Larry]

Bikes were used extensively in WWI & WWII. Folding bikes were used by the Italians in WWI as well as British and American forces in WWII. Germans used bicycles on all fronts. Bicycles were decisive in the Japanese capture of Singapore in WWII. Bicycles also were critical in the successful movement of ammo and supplies along the Ho Chi Minh trail during the Vietnamese War. Lastly, bicycle brigades played an essential role in plans to protect Switzerland if it were attacked by the Eastern Bloc during the Cold War.

[John F. Ptak]

I'd like to know what "extensively" means. The only time where bikes seemed to me to make any difference is when they were used by the Viet Cong to ferry heavy supplies. Bikes as a part of the defense plans for Switzerland might've worked out okay if they were being attacked by Soviets etc. on bikes.

[Jonathan Daggar]

"extensively" means "by large numbers of troops in several theaters."

[John Ptak]

You mean like *thousands* of troops moving down streets without maiming/killing one another? Seems extraordinary to me after all of the possible foul ups that could occur that in the end it was worth the time and effort. At least in marching your troops are going to get there, and get there together.