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Penny-farthing
This bicycle was popular between 1874-1886.
They’re fun to see ridden but, they were fast, and dangerous. With the exception of the railways nothing was faster on the roads.
They were dangerous because the risk of falling was great. Heading over the handlebars was problematic. So makers tried making the handlebars so riders knees could clear them. They had design changes that included reversing the large and small wheels but, that proved dangerous as well by being thrown off the bike backwards when going uphill.
It got its name from the size of its wheels-the front was large like the British penny, the smaller back wheel was the farthing.
The Penny-farthing fell out of favor when the safety bicycle was invented in the 1890’s.
I saw this bicycle and a few other odd ones in Sonoma, CA back in 2011.
more to come…
Circadianreflections Blog 
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