The History of Childrens Strollers
Baby strollers have come a long way in a history that spans
nearly three hundred years. But just how far have they come? At
first glance, you may think that today’s active strollers have
nothing in common with the Victorian styled prams of the 1700s,
but you may be surprised that they still share some very basic
design features.
The evolutionary journey of the baby buggy is full of fits and
stops, but it is a path clearly marked through history by several
very big turns.
The First Buggy
William Kent, a garden architect from England, designed the
first known baby carriage for the third Duke of Devonshire in
1733. Kent, remembered more for his radical garden designs than
for his carriage idea, created the baby carriage in the shape of a
shell that a baby could sit in. It was decorated with a snake
design and used a harness to be pulled by a goat. It also was
designed with springs so that the Dukes children could ride in
comfort.
Kent’s design caught on, and soon baby carriages were springing
up in wealthy circles around Europe. They were amazingly detailed
works of art, but they were considered luxuries at the time. The
everyday middle class and working poor of the time could never
afford such an extravagant baby toy.
In the years that followed, several important design changes
were made to the style of the baby carriage. Most importantly,
they were equipped with handles.
This was important because up until that time carriages and
prams were designed as miniature horse-drawn carriages. They were
built to be pulled by dogs or ponies instead of by parents. The
new handles meant that the emphasis was on convenience for parents
instead of a child’s entertainment value.
In the 1840s the baby carriage experienced its first big break
when Queen Victoria bought three push-style baby carriages from
the Hitchings Baby Stores of Ludgate Hill. These carriages were
like many baby carriages of the time—they were too tall to be safe
and too unstable to be really useful.
In those days, however, it was the royalty who set the
fashions. By purchasing the carriages, Queen Victoria ensured that
by the following year anyone who wanted to be part of high society
had a baby carriage to push their children around in.
These nineteenth century models had names to reflect the need
for people to be associated with royalty. Model names like Duchess
or Princess were common. The Windsor and Balmoral models were also
fairly popular, and they were named after famous royal homes.
It is interesting to note that when the first prams and
carriages appeared in the late nineteenth century, they were
banned from public footpaths as other four wheel vehicles were.
Several women were prosecuted for pushing their babies on these
public walking areas, but the law eventually decided that new
mothers with baby carriages didn’t pose enough of a safety risk to
be persecuted.
Richardson’s Patent Changes Everything
On June 18, 1889, a man named William H. Richardson walked into
a Baltimore patent office with an idea that forever changed the
baby carriage.
His idea was for a baby carriage that used a special joint to
allow a bassinet to be turned to face the operator or face away as
in conventional prams of the day. In essence, he created the first
reversible baby carriage.
Several changes he made also went into the axles, which allowed
for greater turning ability. Up until that time, baby carriages
had solid axels that did not allow for independent wheel movement.
The front wheels turned together, and the back wheels turned
together. Richardson’s carriage allowed for the wheels to turn
individually—which meant that the vehicle could turn 360 degrees
in a much smaller turning radius.
Many of Richardson’s design modifications are still in use
today.
The War Years
When World War One drew to a close just before 1920, the
ensuing baby boom opened the market for baby carriages to all but
the poorest families. It was during this time that the issue of
safety really took hold for baby carriage designers, and over the
next several years some very important modifications were added.
Footbrakes became a standard feature on all baby prams and
carriages. The baskets on prams were deepened so that children
would have a more difficult time escaping from them. Also, most
carriages were lowered, so that any child resourceful enough to
get out of their basket would have a shorter trip to the ground
below. Several designs were used in the twenties and thirties, but
eventually the high sided, large wheeled carriage that we still
see today became the norm in baby carriage design.
Aesthetically, rubber and plastic parts became more common on
prams and buggies, replacing the old wicker and wood models of
earlier years. Chrome also became more prevalent, starting with
basic chromium plated joints used to replace expensive brass ones
and later moving to every exposed piece of metal.
By the 1950s, baby carriages were a must have for any new
parents. Cheap materials and safe designs made buggies fashionable
again, and this time everybody could afford them.
Maclaren and his Umbrella
In 1965 an aeronautical engineer from London named Owen
Maclaren listened to his daughter complaining about her trip from
the United States to Britain with her old pram in tow and decided
to help her out. Realizing that her problem was that she needed
something compact and lightweight enough that it could be stored
away when not in use, Maclaren used his knowledge of airplane
manifolds to build his daughter a baby buggy that could do all
those things and more.
What he invented was the umbrella stroller, the first true baby
“buggy” and he forever changed the baby carriage world with it.
Using a light-weight aluminium frame that could fold down into a
compact size, Maclaren developed his stroller to have amazing
load-bearing capabilities as well as being safe enough for his
grand child to ride in.
Strollers quickly replaced prams and carriages as the vehicle
of choice for new parents, a trend that continues to this day.
Aspects of Maclaren’s buggy can be found in literally every single
baby buggy and stroller available in today’s markets—a testament
to his genius.
The Baby Buggy of Today
These days, baby strollers are just as popular as they were
fifty years ago. New strollers are continually being designed and
upgraded in an effort to attract customers. Today’s baby buggies
are light and simple to use, but full of bonuses like air filled
tires, steering wheel activity bars, and drink holders. At the
same time, every effort has been made to make them stylish and
attractive as well.
Buggies have branched out into other markets. Now special
buggies are made for new babies and toddlers. There are heavy,
full sized luxury strollers and tiny fold away light-weight ones.
Designers have come up with ways to combine prams and buggies, and
to turn car seats into easy-to-use baby buggies. You can even buy
a triple baby stroller for triplets!
Designers also make use of space age plastics and composite
metals that make buggies lighter and safer than at any point in
history.
In the 1980s a man named Phil Baechler decided he wanted to go
for a run with his son in tow. Realizing that the standard baby
wheels on his stroller would never survive a good run, he decided
to replace them with bicycle tires from his garage. After a couple
designs he finally came up with one that worked—and the
three-wheeled “Baby Jogger” was born.
Now known widely as jogging strollers, this has been another
fundamental design shift in the style and use of the baby buggy.
The baby jogging stroller has lead to other modifications, such
as off-road tires for parents who like to get out of the city in
their spare time, and several types of carriage strollers used to
attach to bicycles. The face of the stroller is literally changing
every day. Who knows what the next great buggy design will be?
The baby buggy has come a long way from the early carriages and
prams of the eighteenth century to the modern jogging strollers on
the streets today. One thing has always remained, however. People
will always need a convenient way to get babies from point “A” to
point “B”.
This in itself has secured the baby buggy’s place in the world
of child care.
Childrens Clothing
