Chicago's Tall Bike History
Chicago's Tall Bike History
One hundred years ago, in the golden age of the bicycle, tallbikes were a common sight in Chicago. When all the streets of the city were lit by gaslight, the lamplighters made their way from pole to pole on tall bicycles to repair and relight the gas mantles and replace the glass globes from their high perches. When the highwheeler bicycle was replaced by the safety, the lamplighters switched to specially constructed tall bikes very similar to the ones we are familiar with nowadays.
Of course, it wasn't long for the lamplighters to begin using their bicycles for non-professional purposes. They held tall bike races and stunts. And some attempted to outdo others with even taller bicycles. And so we discover this enticing fragment and photo of the Eiffel Tower Cycle in the volume Märkvärdigheter ur Naturen, Historien och Lifvet, published in Chicago in 1899 and edited by J.G. Princell.
"Sedan kommer Eiffeltornscykeln; visserligen ej så hög som tornet ifråga, men dock allt för hög att åkas af andra än våghalsar. Sådana finnas dock i mängd, och derför kan man understundom i större städer få se personer åka på en sådan bicykel. Vi ha sett den här i Chicago, och som de måste gå saktaoch försigtigt och alltid väck uppmärksamhet, äro de goda skyltar och vanligtvis försedda med plakat, som annonserar någon slags vara — oftast cigarrer, hvadan man kan antaga att det endast är förtjensten som lockar någon att åka på dem."
6. Eiffeltorns-cykeln.
An English translation of the text:
"Then comes the Eiffel Tower bike, admittedly not as tall as the tower in question but still too tall to be ridden by anyone but daredevils. These however there are a number of, and that is why you can sometimes in larger cities see people riding such a bicycle. We have seen this one in Chicago, and since they always have to go slow and carefully and have always attracted attention, they make for good billboards and often equipped with a poster advertising some sort of goods — often cigars, which one can assume is the only reward that tempts anyone to ride them."
