Bicycles

This primary source set was created in 2022 as part of a Library of Congress Teaching with Primary Sources grant.

Transportation-focused set about early bicycles and their industrialization of the American landscape. The set is inspired by a University of Arizona course in which the instructor focused their research on early bicycles. The set includes primary sources like musical scores, a political sketch, and bicycle catalogs.

Bicycling / Hy Sandham ; aquarelle print by L. Prang & Co. c. 1887. (Library of Congress)

Columbia bicycles. Catalog, 1899 (Library of Congress)

Bicycle repairing.1896 (Library of Congress)

Price list of bicycles and bicycle supplies, undated but late 1800s (Library of Congress)

"Reform on bicycle" artistic drawing, circa 1884 (Library of Congress)

Bicycle Girl score for voice and piano, 1897 (Library of Congress)

Bicycle song, 1896, notated music (Library of Congress)

Miss Bicycle print. Print shows a young woman walking beside a bicycle through sand dunes toward the water. Circa 1894 (Library of Congress)

Bicycle race photograph, 1922 (Library of Congress)