Over nine days, Sarah Maddock and her husband, Ernest, rode their bicycles along the inland route that would later become the Hume Highway. In so doing, she became the first woman to cycle between the colonial capitals. Ernest had already made the same journey a decade earlier, but no one cared about that. Everyone wanted to talk about Sarah.
Nothing about Sarah conformed to expectations — and certainly not the way she looked. People expected to see a sturdy type, someone with chunky thighs and a weathered face. Instead, they saw a tall, slim woman with fine features and a ‘poetically pale’ complexion. Sarah looked less like an overlanding pioneer and more like a genteel lady of leisure who had just finished lunch at a city café. Her poised exterior masked exceptional determination and endurance. Although she would have recoiled at being described as an athlete, she was in fact one of the most audacious female riders of her generation.
Born in 1860 at Wolumla, near Eden on the far south coast of New South Wales, Sarah grew up on a dairy farm. By 1890 she had married, moved to Sydney and had three children. With Ernest’s encouragement, she learned to ride a bicycle in 1893, at the age of thirty-three. Although blind in one eye — the result of a childhood accident — Sarah was undaunted. Limited peripheral vision and impaired depth perception presented no barrier to her cycling ambitions. After just a few months, she accompanied her husband on the 483-kilometre ride to Bega, averaging nearly 100 kilometres a day. Reported as the first long-distance ride by an Australian woman, it started her lifelong passion for bicycle touring.
More than double the distance of the Bega trip, her Sydney-to-Melbourne ride attracted far more attention. Commentators celebrated Sarah’s effort as the longest ride undertaken by a woman, not just in Australia but in the world. The second claim is debatable, but such was the enthusiasm for her achievement that this trifling detail barely mattered. She was a trailblazer, an inspiration. And she was ours.
Like all heroes and heroines, Sarah Maddock made the impossible look effortless. Journalists and readers alike revelled in the details. She conquered miles of mountains, swamps and sandy plains, forded creeks, battled headwinds and overcame bureaucratic obstacles at the intercolonial border. On good roads near Kilmore, she easily outpaced a ‘wild bull’ keen to inspect her bicycle.
Entering the outskirts of Melbourne on a Saturday afternoon, Ernest and Sarah accidentally found themselves caught up in the finish of an inter-club cycling race. The crowd of spectators, expecting a field of burly blokes to sprint over the finishing line, were treated instead to the sight of an ‘engaging little lady in ordinary walking dress’ who pulled up ‘looking as fresh as when she stepped out of her drawing room in Sydney’. As the couple left for the city centre, the assembled racing fans gave Sarah a hearty cheer. A few miles down the road, they were met by members of the Melbourne Bicycle Club who escorted them over the final stage of their journey.
Much attention was devoted to Sarah’s clothes. Too much attention for her liking, but it was a sign of the times. The sight of a woman riding a bicycle could still provoke heated debate, although the temperature of the controversy had lowered somewhat by the mid 1890s. Nevertheless, questions and concerns still circulated about the effects of bike riding on a woman’s fertility, her physical health and her chastity. When women took to the wheel, they were suddenly part of the street: free, fast and unchaperoned. Goodness knows what they would get up to.
Australians slowly came to accept the presence of women on two wheels. But the question of what a woman should wear while riding remained contentious. A growing number of women argued for an end to tight-fitting corsets, heavy skirts and high heels that ‘deformed the figure’ and restricted movement. They called for clothes that permitted a natural shape and healthy exercise. Bold women took to wearing knickerbockers and light shirts. They called these outfits ‘rational dress’, just to drive home the point that these were sensible and practical choices. The problem was that, barring a few changes to accommodate the feminine physique, these were the same clothes worn by male cyclists. The gender-bending look could be confronting, to men and women alike.
Sarah knew the issues better than most. But, although a devotee of cycling and a supporter of female independence, she saw the obsession with clothing as a distraction. The real mission was to get more women cycling, without turning their hobby into a political statement or compromising their femininity. Legions of women followed her example, quite possibly because of her more moderate stance.
In February 1895, following the success of the Sydney-to-Melbourne trip, Sarah founded the Sydney Ladies’ Bicycle Club. The nine members who enrolled at its inaugural meeting were lauded in the cycling press as true pioneers who had endured ridicule and ‘gross insult’ from ‘ignorant and coarse-minded people’. Nevertheless, as captain, Sarah had no desire to turn the club into a political cause. At her request, the club uniform was designed to be functional and modest; the intention was not to attract any more attention than female riders did already. Membership grew steadily. Every Thursday and Saturday afternoon, elegant ladies could be seen spinning their way through Sydney streets, each wearing a grey skirt, Norfolk jacket and straw sailor’s hat decorated with a band of red and black, the club colours.
Enjoyable outings with friends in the city were lovely, but Sarah had bigger plans. In early spring 1895 she and her husband left home on their bicycles, riding into a stiff headwind. They made their way to Parramatta, then on to Wiseman’s Ferry, covering 60 miles — or, as a much later generation would think of it, 100 kilometres — in one day. By now, Sarah’s reputation was well established. News spread quickly that she was heading for Brisbane, on yet another record-making cycling adventure.
Once more, such a journey — this time covering 1,000 kilometres — was difficult for the average person to imagine. Most people looking to reach the Queensland capital had to endure two days aboard a steamship. That was bad enough, but the prospect of riding some of the hilliest terrain in the colony on a bike must have been staggering.
NSW roads could be ranked on a broad spectrum from smooth, loose and sandy, rocky, dusty and unrideable to the just plain awful. But the energetic couple rode or walked their bikes for about five to seven hours each day, regardless of the surface or the weather. They took plenty of breaks, ate well at hotels along the way and stayed in basic but comfortable lodgings. After six days, they reached Port Macquarie.
From there they travelled through Kempsey to Bellinger Heads and on to Coffs Harbour. Heading inland, they stayed at the village of Fiddler’s Creek, a little behind schedule after getting lost in the mountains. Next morning, they rode to Grafton to catch the ferry down the Clarence River to Lawrence. Then came another 70 kilometres to make Casino just on dusk. It had been a long day.
The Maddocks spent a few days at Lismore, where Sarah took a moment to visit the offices of the Northern Star newspaper and provide some details of her trip to an eager reporter. Aside from a few spills, dusty roads and hot headwinds, the trip had been splendid, she said casually. Not once had she been ‘sick or sorry’.
When they left Lismore, Sarah and Ernest found themselves pedalling towards the fires that had been burning through the coastal ranges for much of their trip. They kept riding, unsure of how long it might be before they encountered the blaze. They did not get far. Thick smoke made it hard to breathe. Flames lapped the edge of the road. Burning trees that had fallen across the road forced them to turn back. They retreated to Bangalow for the night.
In the morning they got going early, cycling to Byron Bay and along the beach to Brunswick Heads for breakfast. After waiting for the tide to retreat, they continued on for another 50 kilometres to reach Tweed Heads before dark.
Next morning, the weather turned. Lashed by a storm, they pushed on through