Pierre Lallement and His Bicycle - LA84 Foundation

PIERRE LALLEMENT AND HIS BICYCLE.

There lives in Brooklyn, New York Pierre Lallement was born the 25th
(or did until recently, for the writer has October, 1843, in Pont a Mousson, about
not seen him for more than a year), a plain, eighteen and a half miles from Nancy, in
intelligent mechanic, of about middle age, the east of France. Here he grew up, and
speaking our language little and brokenly, after his school-days worked often at the
working industriously at the trade he grape harvests, and lived with his parents.
learned in youth. He is of rather less than Otherwise, he learned in Nancy the trade of
medium stature, dark complexion, and carriage smith, and such blacksmithing as
sincere countenance, of quiet demeanor, went into the construction of baby carriages
but quick in thought and action. He and voitures des malades. At the age of
designed, and put together, and rode the nineteen, he went from home and from
first bicycle. He was the first teacher in Nancy, working a while in Neufchatel, to
the art of bicycling. Paris, arriving there
in the autumn of
He was, it is be- 1862. Here he first
lieved, the first to
discover that a veloci- found employment
with M. Stromaier,
pede having but two a manufacturer of
points of support
could he steadily and baby-wagons and
manumotive car-
continuously ridden. riages of various
He was first to fol-
low up his experi- sorts, and was en-
ments with improve- gaged most of the
ments, and to incite time on piece work,
the confidence of or “contracts.”
others that the bicycle Afterwards he found
was a vehicle of prac- similar employment
tical value. He took with M. Jacquier,—
the first country spin whose sign in Rue
on the bicycle, and the St. Laurent read,
first genuine “head- “Jacquier, Fabri-
er.” He first gave it
to France, and there cant des voitures des
enfants et cheveaux
it profited him little; mechaniques,”—
he first introduced
it to the United until his first leaving
of Paris, to come to
States and patented America.
it, whereby he ob-
In Nancy, L’alle-
tained some reward. pierre lallement. [From photograph, Paris, 1869.] ment had seen the
Then England took aboriginal two-
it without leave or license, made some im- wheeled velocipede ridden on the street.
provements and borrowed others, snatched It was the “aid to walking,” contrived by
the trade from France and America, and the Baron von Drais, but little improved.
sent the “modern” bicycle nearly around Young men of the present day know it
the world. The story of this mechanic and little except by history or tradition. It
his machine has never been fully given to was patented in France in 1816, and
the public1; but it is of much interest, with some modifications in England later,
especially to wheelmen; and it is the pur- and in both those countries, as well as
pose of this article to narrate it as correctly in the United States, came considerably
and fully as reliable sources of information into use, became a subject of satire and
and the space of an article in the Wheel- ridicule in paragraph and in caricature,
man will allow. and, with some revivals, lingered in but

1 The writer regrets that two or three errors crept into the occasional public use until entirely sup-
second chapter of his little book, “The American Bicycler,” planted, about 1868. There are still left
which fuller information from various sources, not accessible a few prominent Bostonians, wearing gray
to him then, would enable him now to correct.

PIERRE LALLEMENT. 5

moustaches, who rode the Draisine in cheval mechanique having three wheels,
their youth; and the writer will reward two of them rear supporting and driving
well the junk-dealer who will produce the ones, and the other a front steering one.
one on which Charles Sumner, in his yel- The rear wheels were rotated by means
low waistcoat, disported himself on the of hand-cranks and an endless chain; the
classic streets of Cambridge. front one was deflected to guide the veloci-

The engraving here, drawn exactly from pede by the feet resting on “footsteps” or
an old London print of 1819, gives the pins in the swivelled fork or standard in
reader a better idea of the machine which which the fore wheel revolved, and placed
suggested the bicycle to Lallement than one on either side about two inches above
any description; but it may be observed the axle.
that the tandem wheels and spinal seat-
Lallement was quick-witted. He could

boulevard saint martin, in 1863.

bearing body, and the swivelled front-fork, differentiate, and put things together. If
with lever-attachment for guiding by the hand-cranks, why not foot-cranks? If foot
hands, were already there. This be- steering by a front wheel, why not both
stridden walking-stick on castors was al- foot steering and foot propulsion by the
most ready and waiting for a cranked axle same? If that would do on a three-
and pedals, to become a vehicle. No wheeled velocipede, why not on a two-
rider or maker, however, could yet see wheeled, after gaining velocity enough?
how to do this, or could trust to a carriage For the fact had been discovered with the
with but two points of support without one “célérifère,” that at considerable speed, as
or the other foot or both to reach the in descending a hill, equilibrium could be
ground for preservation of uprightness. maintained with the two-wheeled machine
Lallement had also seen in Nancy, what by deflecting its course according to its
was made for boys, and was a carriage, a inclination. The idea stuck and grew in

6 PIERRE LALLEMENT.

his mind. He conceived’ his bicycle in pedals of square wooden pieces with sheet-
1862, and worked it out as his circum- iron on top, and screws for the feet to
stances would permit, his struggle with it come against and a weight on the bottom,
extending to 1866, and following him shaped like an acorn, to keep them right-
from Nancy to New Haven. side up. A seat was placed nearly mid-
way between the wheels over the perch,
Lallement was poor. His work in and bestriding it one could touch the floor
Paris brought him in small returns,—be- on either side with his foot.
tween five and ten dollars a week when
there was enough to do. He managed Having completed his first experimental
soon, however, to purchase two small machine, Lallement had before him the
wooden wheels with iron tires; then he difficult task of riding it. Any one with a
got a fellow-mechanic to make a curved vivid recollection of his own first efforts,
perch of wood carved in the form of a or those of others,—with the assistance of

the draisine in england. [From a print of 1819.]

snake, for which he paid a “little money instructors, too, the information gained
and a good deal of drink”; then he bought from old riders, and the confidence inspired
pieces of iron from his employer, and, by knowledge that such machines are
with occasional help at the anvil from a ridable,—can understand the persistence
companion in the shop, he wrought out required by the first rider. He learned to
the remaining parts, on Sundays and handle it in the long hall-way and shop of
out of working hours, and put them M. Stromaier, and assisted his compan-
together. There were axles and bearings, ions there to do it; and in the first days of
braces from the rear axle to the perch, July, 1863, or earlier, he rode it publicly
on the Boulevard Saint Martin, “and all
front forks, and cranks, and forged socket the people saw it.” Some examined and
fitted to the perch, and spindle, and tried the new vehicle, many wondered at
handle-bars. The handles were of wood, it, and probably more laughed at and de-
and the first pedals were round spools of rided it. Once shown how, it was easier
wood; afterwards he made a pair of

PIERRE LALLEMENT. 7

for others to put cranks to the Draisine, he had been trying to obtain financial
and there were a few to make a note of it. aid.
The artist has well reproduced one of This first bicycle spin proved both inter-
these scenes on the Boulevard St. Martin, esting and amusing. The route lay through
as it was twenty years ago, and as the first a part of the main street in Ansonia, over
bicycler returned from one of his short a long bridge, and the main country road
rides. The view shows the historic Port south, to the thriving manufacturing village
St. Martin and the corner of the Rue de of Birmingham (which nestles about a hill,
Faubourg St. Martin, on which was the with a fine green near the centre and the
shop of M. Stromaier and the inception of main street, and overlooks charming vil-
bicycling. lages) and back again,—a distance of about
This experimenting, continued for a four and a half miles, by the more modern
considerable time, satisfied Lallement that cyclometer. The grades were a little hard
the idea was a practical one, and incited for our first voyageur on the out-run, but
him to further effort to make it a popular correspondingly
success. He found his machine wanting easy on the re-
in rigidity, and not well enough made. turn.
He took it apart, discarded the wooden There had
snake-like perch, and flung to the junk-
heaps all the other parts except the wheels. been rains, mak-
ing rills in the
He began to build anew, as he could gain gutters, and a
time and money, at the shop of his new considerable
employer, M. Jacquier. But he rush of water
did not complete it here. Working under the cul-
hard for small returns, with no re- vert at the foot
sources but him- of the long hill,
self and a few —somewhat
tools, it was a steeper then
slow, hard out- than it is now
look for working after eighteen
up a new enter- years of filling
prise. He looked at the bottom
toward America, and reducing at
whither so many the top,—first
of his country- reached at the
men had come, north of Bir-
for quicker and
more profitable mingham.
Lallement had
opportunities. no brake, and
Lallement came the bicycle in 1865. he could not

to the United States of America by way back-pedal. Exhilaration at his easy and
of Havre, London, and Liverpool, arriv- rapid approach turned to consternation as
ing on the steamer “City of London,” his speed quickened to an uncontrollable
in July, 1865. After some stay in New rush down the slope, and he saw that
York he went to Ansonia, Connecticut, a jogging span of horses, holding back
a manufacturing village in the beautiful a wagon and two men, occupied the
Naugatuck Valley, about twelve miles roadway before him, unconscious of his
west of New Haven, and found employ- advance. He yelled to the men, in foreign
ment there at better wages. He had accent. They gave one look behind at the
brought with him the two wheels, a new hurrying monster almost upon them, and
forged wrought-iron perch, and cranks whipped their horses to a run. It was too
partly done, from Paris. He continued his late for Lallement. His wheel, deflected
work with them in the fall of 1865, com- to avoid a collision, struck the edge of the
pleted and finished up his “veloce,” and culvert, and careened. The positions of
was able to ride it some that fall for ex- rider and vehicle were. suddenly reversed,
hibition, and to and from the shop where he and the rider still wears the scar of that
worked. Soon he essayed a longer road too impulsive embrace of mother earth.
ride, and one that he thought would test Our hero of the first “header” gathered
the qualities of the machine for road himself and his bicycle together, rode on
use, and convince the sceptics from whom to the main street in Ansonia, stopped at

8 PIERRE LALLEMENT.

the tavern, and, tilting his machine against found at last a man willing to advance the
a hitching-post, went in. There he found money necessary for obtaining a patent and
the two men, relating between drinks how to take a half-interest; and on the 4th of
they had seen the dark Devil, with human May, 1866, his specification, model, and
head and a body half like a snake, and half drawings were filed in the United States
like a bird, just hovering above the ground Patent Office, making the first public
which he seemed no way to touch, chase record of the bicycle in the world. But
them down the hill, and, just as he was neither he nor Mr. Carroll had resources
about to board their wagon, disappear in for working the invention and introducing
the water by the roadside. The bar- it into public favor; nor was Lallement
keeper was smilingly incredulous, as, with able, either in Birmingham, whither he

a street scene in ansonia.

the earnestness of amazement, they assured went for a time, nor in New Haven after-
him it was true. wards, to secure the means to make it
profitable, even for some months after the
“I vas ze diable,” exclaimed Lalle- patent was granted. He had brought his
ment, advancing, and endeavoring with bicycle to a degree of practical success,
scant English and much gesture to explain. induced some to try it, patented it, ridden
But they would not believe him until he it even from New Haven to Ansonia, tried
had produced and again bestridden the American temper and capital; and then,
mysterious machine. after all, he left his still unappreciated
vehicle in New Haven, and returned to
In the spring of 1866 Lallement went Paris apparently as far from a fortune as
to New Haven, and there rode his novel when he left.
vehicle on the “Green,” or public square,
and on the streets. There was a tradition Lallement did not see that precursor of
that he was once or twice arrested and put the finer bicycles of to-day for about four-
in the lock-up in that city, at the instance teen years. It has thirty-four-inch fore and
of irate drivers. At any rate he there

PIERRE LALLEMENT. 9

thirty-two-inch hind wheels of wood, with tubular forks and perch, and the graceful
iron tires, socket-head, solid wrought-iron curves and bifurcation of the latter, and
backbone, and front fork and rear braces, the fine results of mechanical perfection,
twenty-five-inch curved handle-bars, fixed and every beautiful style of finish. But in
iron cranks with five and a half inch throw, it still are the really distinguishing features
weighted pedals, stuffed seat, and a linked of the bicycle and all that made the subse-
spring, and it weighs seventy and a quarter quent improvements possible.
pounds. The cuts heretofore published as
representing Lallement’s velocipede were Compare Elias Howe’s sewing-machine
taken from the patent-office drawing which with the “Hartford,” or any of the fine me-
was made from the small wooden model chanical seamstresses of to-day, and see how
filed with his specification, and do not ex- much was wanting. He had the essentials,
however, and his reciprocating eye-pointed

birmingham green.

actly represent the original machine in needle, which would serve the double
form or proportions. The latter is fortu- function of needle and hook, was his chief
nately fairly well preserved, and has been specific contribution. So Lallement’s solu-
the object of amateur photographs and tion of the chief difficulty lay in putting
sketches for these illustrations. Compared foot-cranks on the front wheel, and making
with what we of this decade know as the it serve the treble functions of guiding,
bicycle, it is a crude affair. It is without balancing, and propelling the velocipede.
brake, or trouser-guard, or means to limit
the motion of the front wheel; it has not When Lallement returned to Paris he
suspension wheels, with all their improve- found that the new velocipede and the art
ments, nor the round contractile rubber of riding it, which he had taught in the
tires, nor the familiar saddle, nor adjusta- shops of Stromaier and Jacquier and on
bility of crank throw or seat, nor anti- the Boulevard St. Martin, had not been
friction bearings, nor the elastic free and forgotten. Other mechanics were repeating
ever-ready pedal; here are absent the his experiments; and not only was there
employment for him, but other makers of

10 PIERRE LALLEMENT.

mechanical carriages, Michaux et Cie., and cycles, or three-wheeled,” etc. In 1868
M. Magee, were willing to make véloci- and 1869 the French were using an im-
pèdes a pédales, as they began to be called. mense number, and France was supplying
Exhibition of them was made at the other countries with the most and the best
World’s Fair of 1867. In 1868 they were (prices for export being £25 and even
making them in earnest, and riding them higher), as England was a few years later.
widely in France, and one or two were The spread of bicycling in France, and
taken to England. In April of that year its check by the disastrous war of 1870,
Michaux patented a break, applied to the have been well sketched, only too briefly,
rear wheel, and in the circulars of his firm by the veteran wheelman and journalist,

the first header

the new vehicle was le vélocipède a pédales M. Paul Devillers, in The Wheelman,
et a frein; his patent and subsequent ad- Vol. 1., p. 307.
ditions covered improved cone-bearings,
and other details of improvement. The Whilst others in Paris were improving
price that year ran up to 400 francs. the construction of the bicycle, Lalle-
Although the name bicycle was applied ment, though at first retarded by want of
to them probably as early as 1867, it was means and by the hesitation of’ others to
not until 1868 that it obtained much use; aid him, was doing some of that needful
and in 1869 it was the common term. work too. It is noticeable that the first
Even then in French price lists printed in public prints to show the rider in position,
English, as those of Lallement, Shand, with the ball of the foot, instead of the
and Michaux, the explanation was carried hollow of the foot, on the pedal, are in
out, under the general head of velocipedes, Lallement’s illustrated price-lists; and there,
—“Bicycles, o r two-wheeled,”—“Tri- too, was the first direction to intending
purchasers that it is necessary to “give

PIERRE LALLEMENT. 11

the length of the person’s legs,” for selec- Lallement’s by the same; and the other
tion from different sizes. makers paid a royalty of twenty dollars a

Whilst the few riders in France in 1867 machine to Mr. Witty.
and the more in 1868 were making the Lallement received ten thousand francs
bicycle frequent on the roads, in the latter for his half of his American patent. One
year riding, two of them, at least, an quarter of it was paid down first, and the
average of seventy-five miles a day for six other three quarters after an exhaustive
days, and two others making one hundred search, in 1868, in France and elsewhere,
and five miles in a day, and another cover- to ascertain the validity of the patent, and

in the naugatuck valley.

ing one hundred and twenty-three miles of Lallement’s claims to be the inventor.
in twenty-three hours of a tour,—the art That sum was a large one for him, enabled
was being pursued in America more on him to strike out well in his business in
the stage, by the Hanlons and others, and Paris, and was the only direct pecuniary
in the shops and rinks, at first; and the reward he ever got for his invention.
use and construction, of bicycles grew with The patent expires with the 20th of
rapidity until the climax of 1869. Mean- November next, and the “velocipede
while many patented improvements were patent question” will then relate to other
made, and the original Lallement patent be- patented inventions subsequent to Lalle-
came valuable. The half-interest of James ment’s, and there will probably be less
Carroll was purchased by Mr. Calvin sceptics as to his true relation to the bi-
Witty, a New York maker, and then cycle.

12 PIERRE LALLEMENT.

It is interesting to observe in this con- square in the latter city, in October or No-
nection that the result of that search of vember of that year. A full examination
fifteen years ago has never been overthrown. of the remarkable efforts to prove that
It has, indeed, more recently been asserted would extend the length and the scope of
that a bicycle was exhibited at the great this article beyond reasonable limits; but
World’s Fair in 1862, by an English firm; the writer believes, after full examination
but that machine proves to have been a of all the evidence on both sides, first, that
kind of tricycle never made available for Verrecke did not then ride or have a bi-
practical use; and, again, that a Scotchman cycle at all; and, secondly, that even if he
made one in 1836, but that has been did, the construction of the machine and
substantiated by no credible evidence, the idea and method of riding it were bor-
while there is good reason to believe that rowed from Lallement and his exhibitions
he had something else. It has been said in Paris months before.
by some that Pierre Michaux, senior mem-
The divergence and the impulse in the
a pilgrim in 1883. art of veloci-
peding and in
ber of the firm of Michaux et Cie., which the construc-
was once to France about what the Pope tion of veloci-
Manufacturing Company is to the United pedes, originat-
States, contrived the bicycle; but his ed, illustrated,
patent did not claim it, and was not filed and persistently
till nearly two years after Lallement’s, nor promoted by
did he show one until some four years after Pierre Lalle-
Lallement had ridden his first one on the ment, are now
Boulevard St. Martin. It has also, in ex- well and widely
tended litigation now terminated, been known, and are
alleged that one M. Verrecke, a French sufficient to en-
acrobat, arriving in America in September, title him to
1863, rode a bicycle like Lallement’s on some degree of
one stage in New York, and another in remembrance
Philadelphia, and also around a public
and gratitude from wheelmen. The re-
sults are not yet fully seen, of course;
for that art is not old whose originator
is yet at the middle age of forty years.
Interested wheelmen will perhaps often
hereafter take pleasure in visiting the
charming valley of the Naugatuck, and
pedalling over the first country roadway that
knew the sinuous track of the bicycle, and
coast the hill of the first genuine header.
They will find brother wheelmen1 resident
there for welcome and escort. For although
Lallement had not many disciples when in
that country, he has had followers there
since. In the winter of 1868 there was a
riding-school opened in Military Hall, in
Birmingham, and several young, men be-
came proficient; but after the year 1869
the roads thereabouts were unfamiliar with
the bicycle (except by visits from New
Haven since the revival of 1877) until
1881. Then one after another of our later
American bicycles was experimented with
in the vicinity by the natives; and in the
fall of 1882 the Ansonia Bicycle Club was
organized “by a few brave spirits” and in-
creased to about thirty members; and last

1 The writer wishes to make especial acknowledgments
to Mr. Lester E. Hickok, Captain of the Derby Wheel Club,
for kindness in a recent visit there, and for information
furnished.

OA K–CORN. 13

May the Derby Wheel Club was formed at a constant rider of the wheel, since that time.
Birmingham with thirty-two members. He may well be placed, however, in the
And if the principal seat of bicycle-making list of inventors in the industrial and me-
was carried back to Paris, and then to chanical arts, and be remembered as long
Coventry, it is in a fair way to return to as the bipedaliferous wheel continues to
Connecticut by revolve. Let
way of Hart- it be remem-
ford. bered, too, that
The portrait America shares
of the modest
with France
subject of this the distinction
article is from of having in-
a photograph troduced the
taken in Paris bicycle to the
in 1869, when world, and with
he was a man- France and
ufacturer of bi- a name in 1869. England the

cycles there; and his autograph of the credit of improving its crude form toward
same period is also reproduced. He left perfection, and of developing and throw-
that line of manufacture in 1870, and has ing about its uses the social and other
never returned to it. He has not been even attractions which make it a perennial
a “constant reader” of wheel literature, or delight.
Charles. E. Pratt.

OAK-CORN.
Hasten, all ye forest-dwellers,
Crowd your garners, fill your cellars;—
Oak-corn bread and meat provideth,
That each careful creature hideth
Where the hoar-frost cannot taste it,
Nor the winds in winter waste it,
Come and gather, come and gather,
In the misty autumn weather!
Here it was that faun and satyr,
Long ago, were used to scatter
Acorns in these shady alleys,
Tossing them with sportive sallies;
Sylvan in his crown did bear them;
All the sober wood-nymphs wear them,
More esteemed than gem or jewel.
Acorns, rich in food and fuel,
Feed the flock and shepherd’s ingle,
When the frosty planets tingle,
Acorns, where old Merlin slumbers,
Sprout young oaks, in countless numbers,
Through his mossy garments starting,
His long locks and gray beard parting;
While the jay and squirrel chatter,
And the ceaseless showers patter—
Leaves and acorns, all together,
Dropping in the misty weather.
When he wakens, how he’ll wonder
At the forest he sleeps under!

Edith M. Thomas.