Getting from point A to point B has always been more than a math equation to human minds and aspirations. We wanted to get even further. Looking back at all the marvelous inventions in this short history of transportation, we can see the human mind at work.
Modest beginnings of transportation
It probably all began with someone looking at the horizon, thinking of a fast and efficient way to go over it. Walking was the first obvious option but mother nature already provided a form of propulsion.
Its rivers of flowing water and huge bodies of water are sometimes jostled by currents. People made good use of these modes of transport and used them to their advantage, with canoes and rafts as some of the oldest transportation methods.
The history of transportation must include all the domesticated animals that made it possible. Domesticated animals came later and ushered in a revolutionary way of traveling in the world. Now stretches of land could more easily be traversed, worked, and explored.
Horses, donkeys, and oxen are among the most usual animals that come to mind, some other animals include dogs, reindeer, llamas, camels, and elephants.
This increasing number of ways to transport people and goods assisted in the development of trade. Traffic increased and wider routes or roads became a necessity.
History of transportation – before the wheel
Having the means to carry one’s goods also came with some innovations, such as a travois. The word itself has roots in the French word travail which means work.
It was an elongated triangular frame used to carry an assortment of goods. The pointed end could be pulled or pushed by someone on foot or mounted on an animal to drag it along the ground. The travois was, in fact, a precursor to the wheel.
History of transportation invention of the wheel
So simple and yet before it emerged out of someone’s imagination, the concept might have seemed inconceivable. It’s such a shame that no one knows who indeed came up with the wheel, the inventor’s identity is forever lost to history.
Animal-drawn wagons on wheels have been carting people and their belongings since the 4th or 5th millennium BC, from Europe to Asia. Romans needed a lot of horsepower to support the Empire and manage a continuous stream of supplies across the provinces.
The famous Roman roads facilitated access by land onto which armies could march, civilians could walk and trade conducted. Whether using two-wheeled carts or four-wheeled wagons, the advantage of using paved solid roads helped maintain the enormous Empire. In trying to protect themselves from the elements, wagons started having coverings of cloth or wooden frames.
A new way of traveling
This form of transit by wagon with an animal attached at the front to drag it along on rounded wheels had been the way to travel for centuries. Until the onset of the 18th century and the invention of the steam engine.
The steam locomotive condensed the technology of the steam engine with the horse-drawn carriage. This change affected boat travel as well. On land, travel was now faster, but on the water, it meant not always being at the mercy of the waves and currents.
So it’s no wonder that boats were among the first to get an upgrade with the steam engine.
For a while, the whole world looked in wonder at the engine that pushed huge and heavy trains and cars. But other people began using the most basic mode of traveling, a reversion back to a human-drawn mechanism: the bicycle.
The penny-farthing is easily the most recognizable old type of bicycle, with its large front wheel. That design changed over the years into the bicycle we all know and still use today.
Taking a further step
As the old traveling ideas merged with the new tools to power on and carry us to the future, a completely different move took to the air. Flying through the sky now began to feel possible. In the past, we only touched the sky using kites.
China is known to have flown kites before 200 BC. Leonardo da Vinci’s mind was curiously ruminating on flight as shown in his many studies. However, da Vinci never took those ideas out of his sketchbooks and into proper experimentation.
Conquering the sky
Other studies in the 17th-18th century of the Earth’s atmosphere came with the discovery of hydrogen. This brought about the invention of the hydrogen balloon. The Zeppelin was a very famous rendering of that concept. They were used in transatlantic crossings, or over the Siberian plains.
The older version meant that passengers had to endure the cold while traveling in one of these aircraft. Fire was a legitimate risk due to the fact that hydrogen is highly flammable. After the Hindenburg disaster, the zeppelin went out of use.
All these discoveries and inventions paved the way for modern traveling methods. From our cars to airplanes, bicycles, and spacecrafts to the moon, they all had modest beginnings and evolved along with us.
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