the.com/tandem bicycle
A vehicle built to make two people negotiate at eight miles an hour.
means A bicycle with two or more seats and sets of pedals arranged front-to-back, so riders pedal in sync rather than side by side.
from Comes from Latin 'tandem,' which meant simply 'at length' or 'finally' (referring to time). English wit got hold of it in the 1700s and punned it into meaning 'lengthwise' — first applied to horses harnessed one behind another pulling a carriage, a 'tandem' team. When bicycles built for two riders seated front-to-back arrived in the 1800s, the joke rode along with them: the word for 'at last' became the word for 'one after another.'
- nickname
- wedding bicycle, for the loathe-at-first-sight pace
- captain role
- front rider steers, rear rider just hopes
- myth
- divorce rates for tandem couples are unproven, not zero
- origin
- popular in the 1890s bicycle craze, before cars existed