1800 Curled-Toe Ice Skates

EARLY 19th CENTURY IRON CURLED-TOE ICE SKATES

While researching the early history of bicycles, I was tempted to go further back in time and examine other means of individual wheeled propulsion: roller skates appeared to develop along similar lines to bicycles, and the two early pairs of you see in this website are particularly bicycle-like.

But ice skates have a much more ancient history. As a result of this interest, I obtained this pair of ice skates over 200 years old. confirmed by the Antique Ice Skate Club of America.

Here are some extracts from an 1868 book on the subject, The Art of Skating –