CLIL IV

History of
transportation
What is
TRANSPORTATION?
The movement of people and
goods from place to place.
Today, the sight of a man
travelling to space is quite
normal but it has taken a long
time for humankind to travel
like this.
How did people and
things travel many
years ago?
Earliest humans had no fancy transport to
travel. So, when they felt the need to travel and
explore, they used their legs. WALKING was the
first form of transport. Humans and animals
walked to travel from one place to other. For
faster mode of transport, they used animals to
carry things (after having dimesticated them).
However, this was a slow process.
 A small object,
a big discovery
This went on for many years until some round and
spiky was discovered. Can you guess what it was?
A Wheel! The invention of wheel 5000 years ago
changed the way people traveled. Coaches drawn by
horses were used. This increased the speed of
travel to 20 km an hour from a mere 7-8 km per
hour. Wheeled carts also meant that heavier loads
could be transported over longer distances. Travel
became faster than before.
... and then came the roads!
Roads started to be created to travel easily.
The first roads developed from tracks
formed by the footsteps of countless people
and animals following the same routes for
millennia. More traffic on the busiest paths
made them wider and flatter.
The advent of wheeled vehicles spurred the
development of even better roads, leading to
streets paved with bricks and stones.
The Romans were really good at building
roads and bridges, but there are even more
ancient roads in Mesopotamia and Egypt.
On the water
The world’s first civilizations grew up
near rivers, because these provided
water for drinking and for watering
crops. At first, rivers may have been a
barrier to exploration and expansion,
but to people who mastered building
and steering water craft, they acted as
the first highways. Rafts were already
in use in Egypt in 4000 BC. Initially
powered by oars, and later by simple,
square sails, wooden boats enabled
people to travel longer distances.
Running on steam
The advent of the steam engine in the 18th
century revolutionized transportation more than
any other invention since the wheel. Before
steam engines, all transportation was powered by
human and animal muscles, or by using sails to
catch the wind.
James Watt was one of the first inventors of
the steam engine in 1776.
Steam-powered passenger locomotives became a
reality in 1829 with the Rocket, built by George
and Robert Stephenson. Their breakthrough
marked the beginning of the railroads as a form
of public transportation.
The Industrial Revolution
During the 18th and 19th centuries, there were
significant developments intransportation due
to the Industrial Revolution. Beginning in Britain,
the Industrial Revolution saw the development
of advanced machinery and manufacturing that
changed the way the world produced and
traded goods. Alongside these industrial
developments, more advanced modes of
transport were also created: during the
Industrial Revolution, railroads, motorways,
trains, bicycles, cars were invented.
When was the first car
invented?
The first car with a gas engine was made in
1886 by Karl Benz in Germany.
Cars continued to develop around the
world, and in 1908, the first Ford cars were
manufactured in America and were
economical enough to be bought by the
middle class.
Now, there are over 70 million cars
produced across the globe that run on
petrol, battery and hydrogen.
On two wheels
Bicycle design can be traced back to 1817, when
German inventor Baron Karl von Drais built a
two-wheeled vehicle called the Draisienne, which
a rider could push along the ground with his or
her feet. By the 1880s, bicycle manufacturers
were building pedal-powered machines with
pneumatic, or air-filled, tires, making cycling
more efficient and comfortable. Bicycles
evolved a step further in the late 1800s with
the invention of the gasoline engine. In fact,
the earliest gas-powered vehicles were
essentially motorized bicycles, or “motorcycles.”
Up to the sky....
During the 18th century, people started also to
use the air for transport and travel. The first
air means of transportation was the hot air
balloon: using heated air, a large balloon and a
large basket, the first hot air balloon was
invented in 1783 in France, by the brothers
Montgolfier. It was the world's first human
flight technology.
The first airplane
In 1903, the Wright Brothers invented the world's first
controlled, powered aircraft, named the Wright Flyer.
The first flight lasted for 12 seconds, with the plane
rising to just 12 ft (4 m) above the ground.
.
To the infinite and beyond...
In the mid-late 20th century, rockets were
developed that could overcome the force of gravity
and travel out of the Earth's atmosphere. In 1942,
the V2 rocket travelled 200km. The invention of the
rocket was the significant first step in the history
of space travel.
In 1956, the Soviet Union launched the world's first
artificial satellite, Sputnik 1, into space. The first
human spaceflight took place in 1961 and was
engineered by the Soviet Union, with Yuri Gagarin
becoming the first human to orbit Earth.
The fi rst successful spaceflight to the Moon was
made in 1969, with Neil Armstrongand Buzz Aldrin
being the fi rst astronauts on the Moon (Apollo 11).