On September 24, 1895, Annie Cohen Kopchovsky—better known by her sponsored name, Annie Londonderry—returned to Boston after a 15-month journey that made her widely recognized as the first woman to bicycle around the world. A 24-year-old Latvian-American immigrant and mother of three, Londonderry had departed Boston on June 25, 1894, riding a 42-pound Columbia bicycle and carrying the hopes of a publicity-hungry age fascinated by the new freedom of the bicycle.
Her route was anything but straightforward. After reaching Chicago on September 24, 1894, Londonderry returned east to New York, adopted bloomers in place of a conventional long skirt, exchanged her heavy bicycle for a lighter Sterling model, and sailed for France. She then traveled through parts of Europe and Asia before crossing the Pacific and arriving in San Francisco in March 1895. From there, she made the difficult overland journey back across the United States, reaching Chicago on September 12 and Boston 12 days later.
Londonderry sustained the expedition through sponsorships, speaking engagements, publicity, and a talent for self-promotion. Her name itself came from an early sponsorship arrangement with the Londonderry Lithia spring-water company. The trip was often said to have been prompted by a wager requiring a woman to circle the globe within 15 months while earning money along the way, though the precise terms—and whether such a wager truly existed—remain uncertain.
Whatever its disputed details, Londonderry’s achievement became a landmark of the 1890s bicycle boom. Her journey challenged contemporary assumptions about women’s mobility, physical endurance, and independence—and turned a young Boston mother into an international sporting celebrity.
Image via Wikimedia Commons, public domain.
