Aquacyclists Pedal on the PIscataqua
Major David Urch and the Portsmouth Marine Bicycle  

The notion that Portsmouth has recently become a heritage tourism Mecca misses the mark by more than a century. The first "golden age" of Piscataqua tourism began soon after the Civil War. Long before reconstructed "history towns" like Sturbridge Village, Colonial Williamsburg and Plymouth Plantation, visitors flocked to this region. They arrived from distant cities on a network of fast, efficient, public trolleys and trains. And they came to enjoy pretty much what they enjoy today – colonial mansions, historic sites, the fast-flowing Piscataqua River, street festivals, sandy beaches, lively concerts, good cooking, and healthful salt air.

By the closing decades of the 19^th century, the once grand homes built before the Revolution were weathered, ramshackle and unpainted. Wharves rotted along the river and old forts crumbled. And that was exactly what people wanted to see. Along with her faded sisters like Ipswich, York, Salem, and Newburyport – the Port of Portsmouth represented a bygone era. Tourists toiling in the grimy, crowded, modern cities of America spent vacations searching for "the good old days" and found them here. By the summer of 1873 this region was so crowded, according to one account, that a visitor would be lucky to find "a cot by the sea" or an unused pool table to sleep on.

A burst of new hotel construction followed in Kittery, York, Hampton, Rye and other resort towns. Wentworth by the Sea in New Castle and The Oceanic Hotel at the Isles of Shoals were built at this time and are among the rare surviving examples. Victorian-era tourists often stayed for many weeks, exploring the region on hikes, in buggies, on horseback and by bicycle. Cycling became so popular that by the 1890s a reporter counted upwards of 500 bicycles on the lawn of the Wentworth Hotel during an outdoor summer concert.

Portsmouth Marine Bicycle Co.

Although crude bikes existed from the dawn of the 19^th century, the sport of cycling follows the rise of the vacationing middle class after the Civil War. The velocipede or "bone shaker" – literally a saddle on a metal frame connecting two metal wheels and no pedals – was replaced by the familiar high-wheeler or "Penny Farthing" in the 1880s. The giant front wheel and tiny back wheel allowed for speed and flexibility, but mounting and dismounting was a daunting task. The bicycle as we know it, with its equal-sized wheels and shifting gears, also appeared at this time, kicking off the modern cycling sport for both men and women. The Wheelmen, a modern club dedicated to riding antique bicycles, has cataloged 3,140 bike manufacturers operating between 1890 and 1918.

CONTINUE WITH URCH BICYCLE

The rising middle class wanted to see America. The explosion of bicycle patents during this era includes a largely forgotten Portsmouth experiment in human-powered transportation. Why not, Major David Urch of Portsmouth asked, adapt the land bicycle to use on the water?

In 1881 Urch was among a host of inventors experimenting with waterborne bicycles – or "aquapeds" or "hydrobicycles" or "tachypodoscaphs". The name, like the vehicles, never caught on. Bicycle historian Charles Meinert has documented 35 patents for water bicycles during this era, most using a paddle-wheel system. The majority of them were designed by amateurs, not engineers, and never got off the drawing board.

Urch actually patented, built, and marketed his Marine Bicycle Company of Portsmouth, and sold as many as 100 water bicycles, according to Meinert. One surviving Urch vehicle (bearing registration # 46) has recently been restored and is operated by a New York collector. Urch employed a catamaran design with the bicycle frame fixed between two floating hulls. The operator, sitting high and dry on a single big wheel, could carry one passenger. An attached sail provided wind power, when available, and doubled as a canopy against the sun.

David Urch was as unique as his invention. Born in Wales in 1844 (his death date has not been found), he fought in the American Civil War and served in the NH Senate. A rattan furniture maker by trade, Urch is best known as the owner of the toll road and bridge that connected Portsmouth to New Castle island. Here Urch set up a "circus-like" roadside attraction that featured aquarium tanks, live seals and trained horses that jumped from a platform into the river. In 1915 he also built and operated a local "jitney", a connected train of cars powered by a six-cylinder Studebaker engine that taxied visitors and their luggage from Portsmouth’s train station to The Wentworth. The jitney stopped, of course, at Urch’s aquarium, where boats could be rented.

CONTINUE MARINE BICYCLE

The Piscataqua Adventure

The Urch marine bicycle almost sank to the murky bottom of Portsmouth history. Luckily it attracted the attention of local historian Charles A. Hazlett (1847-1920). Hazlett’s Portsmouth family roots dated before the Revolution and his fingerprints are all over the city, as historian of the North Church, founder of the Aldrich Memorial, Odd Fellow, Freemason, and library trustee. Eventually he became president of Piscataqua Savings Bank and in 1915 wrote a detailed history of RockingHam County.

An avid cyclist, Hazlett reportedly purchased the first bicycle in Portsmouth in 1878 and, while demonstrating it, he writes, experienced the region’s first face-plant. In 1880, aged 35, he helped found The League of American Wheelmen (LAW) and in 1882 he braved the swirling Piscataqua in one of Urch’s marine bicycles. Hazlett, also a freelance writer, published is adventures in a series of stories called "Peddling on the Piscataqua" in the club magazine in 1883.

"Cheered by the assembled crowd of friends," Hazlett wrote, "we lowered our propellers and started on the pioneering three days’ trip of fifty miles."

Starting from Urch’s toll bridge, Hazlett and a friend peddled madly against the head tide and around the dilapidated wharves, beyond the old ferry landing and toward Great Bay. Bystanders stared in "wonderment", Hazlett wrote, and one shouted, "Here comes the devil on two sticks." Others swore they had seen men walking on water.

On the way back to Portsmouth in the dark, Hazlett’s propeller clogged with eelgrass. Caught in the deadly Piscataqua currents and unable to pedal, his craft when spinning into a bridge piling and crashed. Had it not been for the separate watertight compartments that kept the bicycle afloat, he reported, the trip might have been his last.

With a repaired aquacycle the next morning, Hazlett and his companion toured "rotten row" at the Navy Yard where the rusted hulks of abandoned war ships awaited destruction. David Urch joined the pair with his sister riding on an attached seat as they left "The Narrows" and toured New Castle. Then the pair peddled to Kittery to see Fort Foster and Fort McClary. They chatted with sailors aboard the USS Kearsage and with the lighthouse keeper at Whaleback. Then with the wind picking up and the whitecaps rolling, the two men without lifejackets, hoisted their ancillary sails and biked six "exhilarating" miles to the Isles of Shoals. A schooner, thinking the men were clinging to the hull of capsized boats, tried to rescue them.

After a refreshing night’s rest at the Appledore Hotel, Hazlett and his companion biked to White Island, climbed the lighthouse stairs and viewed the $30,000 Fresnel lens. They oiled the marine bike machinery and, despite a brisk breeze and threatening weather, set out for the mainland. With the wind astern and their sails up, the pair were soon "bounding along in coasting attitude." In little more than an hour they covered eight miles of open ocean, arriving on schedule to join a group of Wheelmen for chowder at Wallis Sands in Rye. By evening, they were back in Portsmouth.

CONTINUE WITH WHEELEMEN

The 21^st Century Wheelmen

Today about 1,500 men and women across the country belong to The Wheelman, although many are armchair enthusiasts, not riders. The club founded by Charles Hazlett and others in 1880 faded with the arrival of the motorcar, but was revived by antique bicycle fans in 1967. Members of the nonprofit group pay $25 to receive a superb magazine, published twice a year that is packed with bicycle lore. To gain voting privileges, a member must ride a high-wheeler for 10 miles. The all-volunteer group holds an annual gathering. A small close-knit family of members ride their antique bikes wearing heavy Victorian clothing in parades and at venues like Strawbery Banke, always spreading the gospel of early American cycling.

Stephen Hartson of Greenland, currently "captain" of the New Hampshire chapter of The Wheelman has been riding antique bikes since he was 10. His father Robert, now in his 70s, still rides a high wheeler. The family tradition began in the 1960s when Hartson's’ grandfather found a discarded "Penny Farthing" at the dump. That doesn’t happen any more, he says, when a collectible bike can be worth over $10,000. The Wheelmen ride only vintage bikes dated from 1818 to 1917. A working original can be purchased these days for $1,500 to $2,000, Hartson says, and novice riders often start out on less costly reproduction cycles.

"It isn’t as hard as it looks," says Hartson, who admits that training is best done at the beach where face-plants on a big-wheeler are less painful. "Within an hour I can have almost anybody up and riding."

But asked if he would like to ride an Urch marine bicycle out to the Isles of Shoals, Hartson just rolls his eyes. He loves riding 100-year old bikes wearing antique clothes -- but he isn’t crazy.