A new biography explores Colonel Albert Pope and his contributions to Hartford’s Golden Age

By Wendy Orlando, The Hartford Advocate – March 15, 2001

In the late 1800s Hartford bustled and its workers thrived, much of that due to the advent of bicycles.  In that era, it was a bike manufacturer—not a weapons company or a textile mill—that was Hartford’s largest employer and Henry Ford’s biggest fear.  Colonel Albert Pope brought the bicycle manufacturing and marketing industries to Hartford, and with him came prosperity and freedom for many Americans in Connecticut and elsewhere.  And if a few historical events had occurred differently, ‘Hartford and Albert Pope” may have won prominence over “Detroit and Henry Ford.”

Connecticut author Stephen B. Goddard has written a book about Pope, the man responsible for the American bicycle and a part of Hartford’s economic Golden Age.  The book, Colonel Albert Pope and His American Dream Machines:  The Life and Times of a Bicycle Tycoon Turned Automotive Pioneer was released earlier this year by McFarland & Company Publishers.  It is both a biography of Pope and a history of Hartford.

Born in 1843 and originally from Boston, Pope, a high school dropout and Civil War veteran, was a millionaire before the age of 30.  He was a manufacturing businessman in Boston before he ventured to Hartford to begin a band new industry of bicycle production.  The late 1800s was a businessman’s euphoria, for free-trade was ousted by protectionism, favoring the American businessman.  As author, Goddard reminds us, “In America, business was still king.”

Pope first saw a primitive bicycle at the 1876 Centennial Exposition in Philadelphia.  That date would prove to be a watershed, for it was at that year’s Exposition that a certain young thinker displayed the telephone and someone from Britain brought over what would later be called a bicycle.  The high-wheeled “velocipede” mesmerized Pope, and he soon traveled to Britain to gain importing rights.

In 1877, Pope created the Pope Manufacturing Company in Boston to market imported velocipedes.  After much success, he secured patent rights to produce the American bicycle.  Looking for a plant with enough space and skilled workers to produce a test order of 50 velocipedes, Pope came upon the Weed Sewing Machine company, spanning many blocks on Capitol Avenue in Hartford.  In the 1870s, the sewing machine industry had reached market saturation and large wings of the plant lay idle.  It was the perfect setting for a new line of production.  In 1878, Pope contracted with the Hartford company and manufactured the first American bicycles, to which he gave the trade name “Columbia.”

Goddard’s book, full of historical facts, describes the plethora of skilled workers in the Hartford of the late 1800s.  It was the perfect place to produce a new product.  Just as cell phones and DVD players are rampant among today’s consumers, so were bicycles then.  People of all means scrimped and saved to buy the new vehicle of transportation.  For many people, $125, the cost of a bike, was several months’ salary, but after 40 years of being confined by railroad schedules, people were relieved to have the freedom afforded by a personal bicycle.

By the 1890s, Pope was the largest New England employer, with 4,000 workers.  Hartford was booming, with insurance companies, cultural icons like Mark Twain and Harriet Beecher Stowe, and the bicycle manufacturing monopoly on Capitol Avenue.  And it was indeed a monopoly; not only did Pope produce and market the item, but he produced all the steel parts needed for the final product.  He bought Hartford Rubber Works in 1892 and created Tube Works, allowing him production power over tubular steel, the secret to a lighter, more consumer-friendly bike.  A lighter bike meant that more people—of both sexes—could ride the vehicle.  That meant more sales.  Of course, the America of 1890 prized monopoly.  It brought work and money to Hartford and transportation freedom and exercise to men, women and children.

Goddard paints multiple pictures with his book: one of Pope the man and business entrepreneur; and another of Hartford as a metropolitan nucleus.  The author hopes that local people will read this book and see possibilities for Hartford’s modern future.

“Perhaps people can use the old essence to believe we can bring Hartford there again,” Goddard says.  “Hartford was once the Silicon Valley of our country.” The difference is that today Pope is replaced by men, women, and conglomerates across the world.  Hartford may still have the skilled workers, but it cannot have the same kind of monopoly.

Pope did no stop with mass production of bicycles  He ventured into automobile manfuacturing as well, attempting to promote electric cars.  But the consumer supported the gas car.  According to Stoddard, Pope made the foundation for mass production, and “Henry Ford traveled to Hartford and visited Pope’s factory.”  Ford won the automobile battle by creating a less expensive vehicle for the average consumer while Pope was too intent on making expensive electric cars.

Although Pope did not succeed with his automobile production, he changed the path of American transportation.  In 1880, only large cities enjoyed paved roads in America.  Pope fought to change that, and his efforts were fruitful when, in 1893, Congress began a nationwide road-building project.

And Pope also helped emancipate women.  A man who funded his two sisters through medical school in a time when very few women went to college, Pope knew that the bicycle could be a vehicle of both economic and social changes.  With lighter, tubular steel, women could maneuver the instrument, allowing the sex greater freedom in movement.  This, in turn, forced the clothing industry to create less-confining attire for women.  Women’s movement advocate Susan B. Anthony once said, ‘The bicycle has done more for the emancipation of women than anything else in the world.”

Colonel Albert Pope and His American Dream Machines follows Goddard’s first book, Getting There (Basic Books, 1994).  The author is also a lawyer in Hartford and teaches history at Trinity College and the University of Hartford.  Goddard is a cofounder of All Aboard!, a 1,000-member advocacy group working to see a regional public transit system in the area.

"Colonel Pope and his American Dream Machines," published by McFarland & Co., is available from Amazon.com for $39.95, or from the author for $31.75 (25% off, plus shipping) or $33.50 if sent to an address in Connecticut (6% CT sales tax).

Please go to Order "Colonel Pope and the American Dream Machine" fill out and submit the information as requested  -- keep a copy for your records and send confirming copy with your check to:  Stephen B. Goddard, 330 Main Street, Hartford, CT  06106.  

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