Good morning, class. Today we'll discuss the history of the bicycle. The first pedal-powered bicycle, called the velocipede, appeared in France in the 1860s. It had wooden wheels and an iron frame, making it very heavy. In the 1880s, the invention of the safety bicycle with a chain drive and equal-sized wheels made cycling much safer and more popular. By the early 1900s, bicycles had become a common mode of transport in Europe and North America. Interestingly, the design we use today is largely unchanged from that era.