Martin Antonenko
A Fixture
- Joined
- Jul 11, 2008
- Messages
- 8,994
A Man Provides Movement ...!
You know this man?
Not? But you should - because without him, hardly anything would move in our world today!
The passionate cyclist is none other than John Boyd Dunlop, a veterinarian born in England on February 5, 1848 ...:
Although the British like to claim Dunlop for his country of birth, the Irish do so with far greater justification - Dunlop spent most of his life in Ireland, where he also died on October 23, 1921 in the Ballsbridge district of Dublin.
And John Boyd Dunlop is - as his name suggests - the inventor of the air-filled rubber tire, without which no road vehicle could roll today!
In 1887, at the age of 47, Dunlop designed its first air-filled rubber tire!
He allegedly did this to get an antidote to his eleven-year-old son's annoying, constantly squeaking tricycle.
First he tried to wrap the wooden wheels of the vehicle with strips of fabric that he won from a torn dress of his wife - but they didn't help!
After surviving the marital dispute that followed, Dunlop glued hoses together from small sheets of rubber, pulled them over the wheels of the tricycle and inflated the casings with a football pump. ..:
The first - not squeaky - successful test drive was completed by Dunlop junior on January 28, 1888 ...:
On December 7, 1888, Dunlop applied for the patent for the first pneumatic bicycle tire and received it the following year ...
After that he ordered 50 bicycles fitted with these tires made by the local bicycle manufacturer W. Edlin & Co.
The invention soon proved itself on a larger scale: On May 18, 1889, the Irish cyclist Willie Hume...
... won the first race with air-filled tires at Queen College Sports in Belfast against the national champion Arthur Du Cros.
In Liverpool, the winning bicycle was displayed on it in the window of a bicycle shop, causing such a crowd that the police were called to clear the sidewalk and street.
Dunlop decided to take production on a larger scale: first he thought of building a factory for air-filled rubber tires in Coventry, England, but was persuaded to create jobs in Ireland, which he now considers his home.
Together with the entrepreneur William Harvey Du Cros (1846–1918) ...
... the father of the defeated cyclist, he founded the company "The Dunlop Pneumatic Tire Co. GmbH" at Belfast
... from which the global corporation "Dunlop" became!
Dunlop withdrew from the operational business after a short time, however, because the sensitive and extremely subtle man did not like his partner's business methods.
Finally, John Boyd Dunlop invented the right accessories to inflate his tires with air - the bicycle valve still in use today with a small rubber hose as a check valve, then called "Dunlop valve" ...:
It didn't hurt him - John Boyd Dunlop, once born the son of poor farmers, died filthy rich!
The original factory building at Belfast still stands today ...:
You know this man?
Not? But you should - because without him, hardly anything would move in our world today!
The passionate cyclist is none other than John Boyd Dunlop, a veterinarian born in England on February 5, 1848 ...:
Although the British like to claim Dunlop for his country of birth, the Irish do so with far greater justification - Dunlop spent most of his life in Ireland, where he also died on October 23, 1921 in the Ballsbridge district of Dublin.
And John Boyd Dunlop is - as his name suggests - the inventor of the air-filled rubber tire, without which no road vehicle could roll today!
In 1887, at the age of 47, Dunlop designed its first air-filled rubber tire!
He allegedly did this to get an antidote to his eleven-year-old son's annoying, constantly squeaking tricycle.
First he tried to wrap the wooden wheels of the vehicle with strips of fabric that he won from a torn dress of his wife - but they didn't help!
After surviving the marital dispute that followed, Dunlop glued hoses together from small sheets of rubber, pulled them over the wheels of the tricycle and inflated the casings with a football pump. ..:
The first - not squeaky - successful test drive was completed by Dunlop junior on January 28, 1888 ...:
On December 7, 1888, Dunlop applied for the patent for the first pneumatic bicycle tire and received it the following year ...
After that he ordered 50 bicycles fitted with these tires made by the local bicycle manufacturer W. Edlin & Co.
The invention soon proved itself on a larger scale: On May 18, 1889, the Irish cyclist Willie Hume...
... won the first race with air-filled tires at Queen College Sports in Belfast against the national champion Arthur Du Cros.
In Liverpool, the winning bicycle was displayed on it in the window of a bicycle shop, causing such a crowd that the police were called to clear the sidewalk and street.
Dunlop decided to take production on a larger scale: first he thought of building a factory for air-filled rubber tires in Coventry, England, but was persuaded to create jobs in Ireland, which he now considers his home.
Together with the entrepreneur William Harvey Du Cros (1846–1918) ...
... the father of the defeated cyclist, he founded the company "The Dunlop Pneumatic Tire Co. GmbH" at Belfast
... from which the global corporation "Dunlop" became!
Dunlop withdrew from the operational business after a short time, however, because the sensitive and extremely subtle man did not like his partner's business methods.
Finally, John Boyd Dunlop invented the right accessories to inflate his tires with air - the bicycle valve still in use today with a small rubber hose as a check valve, then called "Dunlop valve" ...:
It didn't hurt him - John Boyd Dunlop, once born the son of poor farmers, died filthy rich!
The original factory building at Belfast still stands today ...:
