A Family Party Takeing an Airing
Attributed to William Heath ('Paul Pry') British
Publisher Thomas Tegg British
Not on view
A footman dressed in gold-laced livery rides a velocipede with a seat added at the front to accomodate an elderly woman. The latter holds a cat and does not notice that two monkeys torment her driver. Heath devoted a series of satires to velocipedes--foot-propelled bikes popularly called hobbies--in response to a craze that swept fashionable London in 1819. Denis Johnson developed a British model, derived from one patented in Baden in 1817 by Baron Karl von Drais (called a Laufmachine (running machine) or a Draisine). The craze lasted less than a year, declining as accidents mounted and fines were imposed on those who rode on sidewalks.
