Riding a Ladies’ Safety, ca.1915, v1988.468.28; Michael Shellens family collection, ARC.094; Brooklyn Historical Society.

From the desk of Julie May, Photo Archivist: For the past couple years, I have commandeered a May blog post or Photo of the Week to exhibit my love of bicycles – both as an activity and as an interesting graphic among Brooklyn Historical Society’s photography collection in acknowledgement of National Bike Month.  Unfortunately, I have not discovered any new bicycle photographs in the past year to share and so I am recycling the one above from the Michael Shellens family collection.  The two young ladies photographed are likely the daughters of Michael Shellens, Ruth and Hazel, taken in one of the family’s homes in Sunset Park.  Ruth is about to leave her sister behind in a ladies’ safety bicycle, a development for cycling that made it easier for ladies to ride while wearing dresses.

Hopefully this picture will entice half the population to throw on a sundress and get out on a bike and the other half to ride along.  If you don’t know where to go or who to go with, there are a ton of events listed at a new website here.  If you don’t have a bike, New York City is about to embark on another development in cycling – bike share!  Coming this July, people wearing all sorts of garments will be able to participate in the joys, without some of the pains, of cycling through Citi Bike – 10,000 bikes at 600 stations.

So by all means, ride any kind of bike over to Brooklyn Historical Society to check out our other photographs, exhibits, and programs — we’re a Bike Friendly Business so you get $1 off admission if you arrive by bike.  Happy, safe, and polite riding everyone!

Interested in seeing more photos from BHS’s collection? Visit our online image gallery, which includes a selection of our images. To search our entire collection of images visit BHS’s Othmer Library Wed-Fri, 1:00-5:00 p.m.