Cycling culture and everyday life · Women on bicycles · 1894–1895
Annie Londonderry turned a bicycle journey into a performance
Annie Cohen Kopchovsky left Boston on a heavy women’s bicycle and returned fifteen months later as Annie Londonderry. Advertising, clothing and good stories travelled with her.
Annie Cohen Kopchovsky left Boston on a heavy women’s bicycle and returned fifteen months later as Annie Londonderry. Advertising, clothing and good stories travelled with her.
A name could be sold
When 23-year-old Annie Cohen Kopchovsky left the Massachusetts State House on 25 June 1894, she also left a husband and three young children. Londonderry Lithia Spring Water paid her to carry its name, and Annie Londonderry was easier for newspapers to sell than Annie Kopchovsky. The journey was travel, advertising and a public performance from its first day.
The first bicycle did not last
She began in a long skirt on a Columbia made for women. In Chicago she changed to a lighter Sterling with a top tube and adopted bloomers. The change was practical and public. At a time when women’s clothing and freedom of movement were being argued over, the bicycle gave a woman distance without requiring a coachman or husband.
Around the world, using several forms of transport
Londonderry sailed from New York to Le Havre, crossed France to Marseille and continued by ship through the Mediterranean and Asia. She rode substantial sections, but did not pedal every mile around the globe. Trains and steamships were part of the route. The feat was also the ability to travel independently and keep public attention alive.
The stories grew
She gave interviews, lectures and sold photographs while carrying advertisements. Tales of war, danger and pursuit changed from town to town. Not every detail fits, but exaggeration was part of the work. If audiences paid to hear about the journey, the journey had to be worth hearing about.
Back in Boston
She returned on 24 September 1895 after roughly fifteen months. The trip was presented as a wager about whether a woman could circle the world and earn money on the way, although the wager itself is difficult to verify. What is certain is that Londonderry returned famous and soon wrote under the name The New Woman.
The bicycle as an entry ticket
She is not remembered for a velodrome record. Her achievement was to use the bicycle as an entry into newspapers, theatres, sponsorship and travel. She sold her name, changed her clothes, took the train, rode on and supplied the press with a story. It was a very modern occupation.
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