Starting with a child’s tricycleSourced
Dunlop’s practical tire had an earlier predecessor
John Boyd Dunlop developed pneumatic tires for his son’s tricycle in Belfast in 1887, then extended the work to bicycles. Another inventor, Robert William Thomson, had patented a pneumatic tire in 1847. A practical improvement can have an earlier history behind it.
The child’s wheel became a development project, not the first-ever concept.
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John Boyd Dunlop · Wikimedia contributors
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Reviewed: 2026-10-05