back then they were still trying to find a way to securely stop these bikes ☞ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bicycle_brake
I’m curious if the pedals even had a sprocket on that thing so the wheels could spin without the pedals spinning. That would give it a means to slow down, though it wouldn’t be comfortable. You’d have to spread your legs to coast and it would take some skill to get your feet back on the pedals without banging up your legs.
but the pioneers of fitting the freewheel to the safety bicycle were Linley and Biggs Ltd who fitted a freewheel from the summer of 1894, in part to assist the operation of their 2-speed ‘Protean’ gear.
By 1899 there was widespread adoption in UK bicycle manufacture of the freewheel, usually combined with the back-pedal brake, and conversions were offered to existing bicycles.
In 1899 the same system in the USA was known as the “coaster brake”, which let riders brake by pedaling backwards and included the freewheel mechanism. At the turn of the century, bicycle manufacturers within Europe and America included the freewheel mechanism in a majority of their bicycles but now the freewheel was incorporated in the rear sprocket of a bicycle unlike Van Anden’s initial design.
