17. The summer of 1816 led to the invention of a new means of personal transportation
Other than walking, the most common means of personal transportation in 1816 was aboard a horse, in Europe and in the United States. Other means included being pulled by oxen and goats, mules and jackasses, and other types of animal-based motive power. But animals needed fodder, and the adverse weather on both continents ensured that food for animals was scarce, making the animals themselves scarce and when available, expensive. Walking was still common across society, including over distances which would cause the modern citizen to hesitate. Walking between Boston and Portsmouth, New Hampshire was not uncommon, for example, as a matter of course while conducting routine business. The same mode of travel was common in Europe, though the merchant class and gentry were adverse to such travel (leading to the English use of pedestrian to also mean plodding or tedious).
A German tinkerer and inventor named Klaus von Drais developed a machine in which a person sat astride a wooden plank, to which wheels had been attached using axles. When the person attempted self-propulsion by thrusting the legs to and fro in the manner of walking, the wheels caused the distance traveled to greatly exceed that accomplished by the length of stride alone. He called it the “Laufmaschine”, which translates to running machine, and demonstrated it during the summer of 1817, when the difficulties of the preceding summer continued to prevail. Today, after decades of improvements and modifications, it remains the basic design of the bicycle. It enjoyed widespread popularity in Britain and Europe, particularly in France, though it was some years before the design, created as a response to the necessity created by the year without a summer, was accepted in the United States.