Walking

[xoxoxoBruce]

In 1809, Captain Robert Barclay Allardice made a bet with one of his pedestrian rivals, Sir James Webster-Wedderburn, that he could walk 1,000 miles (about 1,609 kilometers) in 1,000 hours. The wager? 1,000 guineas. To get around the major problem of needing to rest, Barclay figured if he walked back to back miles–a mile at the end of one hour and another at the beginning of the next–and repeated this strategy throughout the race, he would be able to rest in approximately 90 minute intervals throughout the near 42 day long race. It worked. He completed the walk on July 12, 1809, 42 days after it commenced. The 1,000 miles in 1,000 hours walking feat became widely known as the “Barclay Match”.

Of course when somebody does a well publicized stunt others have to try. Sure enough a bunch of men tried and failed. So did a woman from Australia. That opened the door for at least the Tomboys to try. Enter Emma Sharp, stage right.

Mrs. Sharp, who was then in her early thirties, subsequently declared to her husband, John, that she thought she could do it. John was reportedly not so enthusiastic, stating that walking 1,000 miles was hardly an appropriate task for a woman to undertake.
Undeterred and despite that she’d not actually trained for the event at all, Emma proceeded with her conviction and started making plans for the event. She was fortunate enough to enlist the help of the landlord of the Quarry Gap Hotel, at Laisterdyke, England, who enthusiastically offered up the grounds attached to his hotel as the location of the course. In exchange, he would receive a percentage of the money earned from ticket sales, and no doubt do great business from all the spectators.

Right, not a road course, a closed circuit where the walker could be watched and they could sell tickets.

While the fact that anyone would pay to see someone walking around in circles for days on end may seem strange to us, at the time, competitive walking, or pedestrianism, was one of the most popular spectator sports in the Western world, with certain matches drawing tens of thousands of spectators. Yes, before the internet and TV, our forebears found watching people walk in circles for hours on end an ideal excuse to get together and socialize, in some respects not too dissimilar from NASCAR, but without the occasional flaming crashes.

As for Sharp’s walk, it was likely to draw bigger crowds than most given that she was a woman attempting a physical feat that most of her compatriots of the male persuasion couldn’t do. To make the whole thing even more scandalous in the eyes of contemporaries, Emma decided to dress like a man for the event, a sensible choice given the typical garb of Victorian era women.

Of course a big event like this there will be some betting, and the betting spectators have skin in the game, so when looked like she might make it, trouble reared it's ugly head.

Beyond near constant jeering to break her spirit, about a week before she was scheduled to finish the 1,000 miles, unidentified individuals attacked her with chloroform to rough her up a bit, hoping this would inspire her to quit. She didn’t.

Others threw burning embers in her path, some tried to drug her food, and still others simply resorted to trying to trip her at random times. As things escalated, for her protection, eighteen police officers disguised as working citizens were assigned to her on the final days of the race. In addition to that, during the night, a helpful citizen walked in front of her with a loaded rifle. Emma also walked the final two days with a pistol, which she had to fire in warning a reported 27 times in total to ward off unruly spectators.

But she did it, completed the Barclay match successfully, but no 1,000 guineas prize.

Over the course of the six straight weeks she walked, it was estimated that a total of over 100,000 people turned up at one point or another, with about 25,000 being present to watch her cross the finish line. Despite the fact that the locals celebrated Emma’s success by organizing a band to play on her final day and roasting an ox in her honor, Emma’s husband reportedly hid in the pub, embarrassed by his wife’s antics. He got over his shame pretty quickly, however, using the substantial funds she earned from ticket sales to quit his job at the Bowling Iron Works and open a rug making business.

Way to go John.

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