Happy holidays to all of you out there on two wheels!
A Christmas Wish
May you steer a steady course and everything go well,
No obstacles your pathway cross, when you ring the belle!
Image source: Christmas Card, c. 1898 from The Lady Cyclist: A Gender History of Women’s History in 1890s London, PhD Dissertation, York University, 2009
Elizabeth Robins Pennell’s 1898 book Over the Alps on a Bicycle, illustrated by her husband Joseph Pennell, is now available on Kindle. This edition was “re-mastered” so to speak as an e-book by Cathy Ryan for Eltanin Publishing from the original print copy.
My introduction to the new edition, now available on Kindle, explains the significance of the book and provides a biographical sketch of the author, with details of her opinions about cycling and how her rides fit into the politics of the late nineteenth century world. There is a bonus article at the end of the book, Pennell’s 1894 essay “Cycling” from Lady Greville’s Ladies in the Field: Sketches of Sport.
Early one morning at the end of August 1884, Elizabeth Robins Pennell and her husband Joseph Pennell strapped their luggage to their tricycle and wheeled out of Russell Square before anyone else was stirring. They headed south toward London Bridge, cutting through thick fog and passing a policeman carefully testing every door on his last rounds as they made their way through the quiet streets.
Just beyond Borough, they stopped briefly at the corner where the Tabard Inn had once stood, which was made famous by Chaucer five hundred years earlier as the assembly place for his nine and twenty pilgrims travelling to Thomas Becket’s shrine. This auspicious spot was the starting point of the Pennells’ own Canterbury tale, the first of many adventures a-wheel and the start of a series of popular travel books recounting their cycling excursions throughout England and Europe.
A decade later, another couple, Fanny Bullock Workman and William Hunter Workman made a name for themselves as travel writers documenting similar but more ambitious bicycle trips to remote destinations in Europe, the Sahara and India. Who were the pioneering women cyclists and writers that made up one half of each of these couples, what motivated them to embark on these journeys, and how did their experiences differ over the decade that divided them?
Powerful women on bicycles are everywhere these days–even in the stairwells of The British Museum!
The “Woman power” bicycle kanga shown above hangs in The British Museum’s North Stairs near the Africa galleries. It was printed for the Kali Mata Ki Jai (KMKJ) women’s centre in Gezaulole, Tanzania in 2005. The “woman power” kanga shows a woman on her bicycle with a cargo basket full to the brim. She smiles as she pumps the peddles, riding towards her destination with confidence and determination. Text along the lower side of the print reads “Mwanamke ni Chachu ya Maendeleo,” which translates to “woman is the yeast for development.”
The Kali Mata Ki Jai women’s centre of Gezaulole was established in 1990 by three local women who’s objective was to contribute to development and improve conditions for women in their community, a village of about 5000 people located 10 mile south of Dar es Salaam on the east coast of Tanzania. The centre’s name translates to “long live the black mother.” Before long, a group of ten women were working on projects through the collective. Kali Mata Ki Jai supports women through micro credit training, marketable crafts such as printed cotton and basketry, henna production, small scale farming of crops such as mushrooms, and cycling lessons for girls and women. A charitable foundation based in the Netherlands, KMKJ-ND, which sees cooperation among women in rural communities as a starting point for development, has worked with the centre since 2000.
There’s a new addition the Wheelwomen pages, Flora Drummond.
Check out her entry by clicking thr link above to find out more about how, as a member of the WSPU organising body, Flora contributed to the WSPU cause in England and Scotland.
As usual, there’s some cycling involved!
Wheelwomen is an index of biographies of prominent lady cyclists from the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The page is updated regularly, so do pop by to look for new profiles.
Suffragettes on Wheels: The Bicycle and the Edwardian Votes for Women campaign, Talk at The London Bike Kitchen, April 28th
I’ll be presenting an all cycling, all campaigning suffragettes on wheels bonanza Monday 28 April at the London Bike Kitchen.
Things kick off at 6:30 as part of LBK’s Women and Gender Variant (WAG) night. WaG is a dedicated space for women and gender-variant people to fix their own bikes, with mechanics on hand for help and advice. Read more about LBK’s WAG nights, and the exciting things they do and offer here, as well as how to join here: www.lbk.org.uk
My talk will present highlights from my research on women’s cycling and political activism in early 20th century Britain, with a focus on the suffrage era. Expect suffragettes and suffragists a-wheel on parade, campaigning in the countryside, riding across the country on pilgrimages, and even getting themselves arrested for militant arson attacks.
LBK is a great organisation, and one well worth joining and supporting!
Cycling history turns up in the strangest places. Millicent Garrett Fawcett’s permit to drive a bicycle in turn of the century Johannesburg, shown above, is one such curiosity from the archives.
This small paper license was one of the first ‘hits’ that I came across early in my research on women’s cycling history at The Women’s Library. It may be a minor part of the collection, a piece of ephemera tucked into a box of folders related to Fawcett’s role as a government official investigating conditions in Second Boer War concentration camps, but it’s a fascinating find that reveals a sliver of cycling history nonetheless. Mrs Fawcett’s bicycle licence is a small leaf of paper that reveals a great deal about the wider nineteenth century world that it was issued in.
Leafing through Fawcett’s handwritten notes, correspondence, photographs and early drafts of what was to be a hugely influential exposé on the human impact of war may seem like a strange way to go about researching cycling history. But, buried among the files, along with the last remaining nub of the pencil Fawcett used to jot down her field notes, sat her cycling and driving pass.
Announcing The New Wheelwomen Page
Wheelwomen is a micro-project featuring short profiles of women who made cycling history. While many of these individuals appear in the broader body of cycling and women’s history, they deserve attention in their own right. Not only were they pioneering lady cyclists, but many were accomplished in other aspects of their lives as well, such as politics, education, professional careers, art & literature, and the family.
This page will toast our cycling sisters past and present and put their experiences a-wheel in context. New entries will be listed alphabetically.
Watch for features on activist Frances Willard, racer Tessie Reynolds, society cyclist The Countess of Warwick, champion Beryl Burton and more here. First up will be Sarah Grand, novelist and popularizer of the term ‘new woman,’ who embodied modern womanhood in her career, life, and on her bike in turn of the century Britain.
Explore Women on Wheels
Use the Wheelwomen tab on the toolbar to navigate to the page. Once there, click the portrait of a wheelwoman of interest to find out more. Regular updates will follow.
Know an inspiring wheelwoman?
Contributions and suggestions are welcome! Please get in touch through the comment section or email sheila DOT hanlon AT gmail DOT com.
Haifaa al-Mansour’s new film Wadjda 
raises issues in gender parity that resonate across time and place as it traces one girl’s quest to learn to bicycle. I hopped on my trusty iron stead and sped down to the Renoir, Brunswick Square for an afternoon matinee of the film, risking lightening strikes and melting humidity levels on a stormy summer day.
The eponymous star of the film, ten-year-old Wadjda (Waad Mohammed), a feisty schoolgirl with tom boy tendencies and a penchant for mixed tapes and converse sneakers, becomes set on cycling when she sees her friend Abdullah riding with the other neighbourhood boys. When Abdullah steals her headscarf and rides off with it as a prank, Wadjda vows to get a bike of her own so she can race him. Wadjda’s mother, who is going through a crisis of her own as her marriage unravels, is appalled when her daughter asks for a bike, refusing to even entertain the notion. She reminds her daughter that Saudi girls simply do not ride bikes-especially not nice ones with future marriage prospects to think about.
Without spoiling the bittersweet end of this touching coming of age story, Wadjda clearly lays out how deeply gender disparity is ingrained in everyday life in Saudi Arabia, cycling included.
On June 15th, 100 women on bicycles decked out in suffragette swag will take to the curvy tree lined lanes between Longhorsley and Morpeth, Northumberland. Some will be in Edwardian garb, others in elegant hats, and many will be flying the purple, white, and green. All will have Emily Wilding Davison in their hearts and minds.
June 2013 marks 100 years since WSPU campaigner Emily Wilding Davison was fatally injured at the Epsom Derby. Much has been made of the centenary in the press and women’s communities, but questions remain about the circumstances surrounding Emily’s last act of defiance. Public interest in Emily has been unprecedented–matched only by that of the suffrage era when she became the first ‘Votes for Women’ martyr.
You can find more about Emily in the many articles that have flooded the press in the last few weeks. A quick google search will leave you with more links than you can shake a suffragette banner at. One thing shared across recent coverage is speculation about that century old question: what was Emily’s exact intent when she snuck under the barrier at the Tattenham Corner and intercepted the kings horse?
Read more...Of note among recent coverage is Martin Pugh’s History Today article, “Emily Wilding Davison: The Good Terrorist”, which offers an exacting account of the Davison case and the reaction to it. June Purvis’s editorial in Women’s History Review, “Remembering Emily Wilding Davison (1872-1913)” reflects on Emily’s character, motivation and activism, providing insights that may help understand what happened on that fateful derby day. Clare Balding’s documentary Secrets of a Suffragette is well worth viewing, particularly for its forensic analysis of the film footage showing Emily’s accident. Highlights from The Women’s Library material related to Emily now held at LSE is available to browse in an online exhibit. For a local history perspective, see Morpeth based genealogist Maureen Howes’ book Emily Wilding Davison: A Suffragette’s Family Album. You can also read how the Guardian reported Emily’s death in 1913 on their From the Archives blog.
Two centennial weekends are planned for mid June; The Wilding Festival June 13-16 in Bloomsbury, which Emily would have known well as a London based WSPU campaigner and the Emily Inspires Centennial Weekend June 13-15 centred up North in Morpeth where Emily’s family lived and where her final resting spot was to be.
The Morpeth based Emily Inspires project has spearheaded a host of Davison memorial projects ranging from suffragette teas and banner making workshops, to writing and drawing competitions, to an oral history project involving local school children. Kate Willoughby’s new play exploring critical moments and relationships in Emily’s life, To Freedom’s Cause, premieres in Morpeth June 14th. Morpeth Town Hall will have rare artefacts on view, including Davison family treasures and the WSPU scarf believed to be the one Emily tried to throw over the king’s horse, in an exhibit called “Northumberland’s Lawless Lassie.”
Cycling will play a major role in how Emily’s life and politics are celebrated in Morpeth. As part of “Bikes and Bonnets” a band of 100 cyclists, one to mark each year since Emily’s fatal accident at the Epsom Derby, will trace the route from her mother’s house in the village of Longhorsley to Morpeth. Local artist Elaine Porter has designed Edwardian hats, cleverly constructed to be fit over bike helmets, for the ride.
I will be delivering a series of talks on the subject of suffrage and cycling, linking the two together and exploring the place of the bicycle in the lives of women like Emily and her suffragette sisters. Though details of Emily’s personal life are difficult to uncover, we know that she was a keen cyclist who used her bicycle in both London and Northumberland.
“Suffragettes on Wheels: The Bicycle and the Emancipation of women in Edwardian Britain” talks take place on the following days:
May 29 Longhorsley Village Hall, 7:00
June 14 North of England Mining and Mechanical Engineers Institute, Newcastle, 7:00 pm
June 15 Morpeth Town Hall, 1:00
The talks are free, and last about one hour inclusive of a Q&A session.
I hope to see you at a talk or on the Bikes and Bonnets bike ride!
