On a cup of coffee with Edouard André (1884)
A time travel to New York to meet Monsieur Edouard André, the French horticulturalist and landscape designer, who created the “Parc de la Ville de Luxembourg” on the remains of the old fortress walls.
Prologue - Transformations in Luxembourg induced by the Treaty of London (1867)
Luxembourg is under the rule of William III of the Netherlands, who is grand duke of Luxembourg. In the aftermath of the Austro-Prussian War (1866) and the Luxembourg Crisis (1867), a diplomatic dispute and confrontation between the French Empire and Prussia over the political status of Luxembourg, things are settled with the Treaty of London. The fortifications were a very important military asset at that time. It was decided that nobody should have their benefit anymore.
In Luxembourg itself, the unavoidable demolition of the fortifications was seized as an opportunity for an urban expansion and a remodeling of the city.
According to the stipulations of the Treaty of London, “His Majesty the King and Grand Duke […] shall take the necessary measures to convert the said stronghold into an open city”. Thus the Luxembourg State had to proceed with the redevelopment of the grounds of the former military fortifications. The first plan for the extension of the town, dating from 1868, only established the network of new openings. As for the land itself, the State authorized its sale to private individuals by the law of 21 May 1868, in order to cover part of the costs of dismantling the ramparts and building the new avenues.
When in 1871 the government of the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg commissioned Edouard André to design the future Luxembourg City Park, the former fortress city was in the midst of a major transformation. The dismantling of the ramparts, stipulated by the Treaty of London (1867), had already progressed well. The various forts on the plain front were now nothing more than huge piles of stones, crossed by the new openings starting from the centre of the old city according to the classic principle of “radio-concentration”.
On the Luxembourg countryside, the road network was rudimentary compared to what we have in the 21st century, although end of 19th century was also the epoch in which serious efforts were made to better the situation.
The building of better roads was systematically subsidized by the government, as can e.g. be seen in the “Arrêté du 29 décembre 1884, concernant la répartition des subsides pour chemins vicinaux”.
1884 , a pivotal year in some regards
In 1884, Mark Twain writes The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. He also first conceived of the idea behind A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court in December 1884 and worked on it between 1885 and 1889. In the later book, a Yankee engineer from Connecticut is accidentally transported back in time to the court of King Arthur.
We know that Mark Twain tried to ride a bicycle in that year, and his misfortune is documented by the following quote with his typical wit:
“It was on the 10th day of May — 1884 — that I confessed to age by mounting spectacles for the first time, and in the same hour I renewed my youth, to outward appearance, by mounting a bicycle for the first time.
The spectacles stayed on.”
— Mark Twain’s Speeches
Twain might have had more luck if he would have had tried the newest bicycle model to be released shortly after in 1885!
Indeed, in 1885, John Kemp Starley made history when he produced the Rover Safety Bicycle. “Setting the pattern to the world” with two same-sized wheels, this new bicycle concept provided more stability compared to the then ruling and dangerous to ride penny-farthing.
In 1884, Karl Benz was about to build his 1st automobile. The first stationary gasoline engine developed by Carl Benz was a one-cylinder two-stroke unit which ran for the first time on New Year’s Eve 1879. He completed his two-seater vehicle in 1885. The major features were the compact high-speed single-cylinder four-stroke engine installed horizontally at the rear, the tubular steel frame, the differential and three wire-spoked wheels. In fact, bicycle technology fitted with his engine!
On August 16, 1884, Hugo Gernsback is born in Luxembourg. He would later become known in the United States as an inventor, writer, editor, and magazine publisher, best known for publications including the first science fiction magazine. His contributions to the genre as a publisher were so significant that, along with the novelists H. G. Wells and Jules Verne, he is sometimes called “The Father of Science Fiction”.
As a writer of his time, Jules Verne also wrote about the bicycle. In his 1899 book Le testament d’un excentrique, he took into account the considerable popularity of track races and featured a racing machine called the “triplette”.
In the Luxembourg bicycle scene, 1884 was the foundation year of the Veloce-Club as a subsection of the Cercle Grand-Ducal d’Escrime et de Gymnastique.
“So 1884 it will be”, Jean Schmit whispered.
“Yes. The notes in your pocket are of highest importance. The time travel will cause some temporary memory loss. But the written instructions by your own hand will give you orientation in the first moments. Trust them and your instinct”, the operator said as final words, “I will now activate the automated countdown and leave this place.”
“Let’s do this!”
“Good luck, Jean! May you find what you are searching for in the year 1884.”
Flashes of lightning illuminated the surroundings of Schmit. When the operator checked back a few moments later, he was gone.
Rendez-vous in New York
Jean Schmit (JS), still a bit dizzy: Where am I?
Edouard André (EA), speaking with an obvious french accent: You are in New York, my friend!
JS: I mean, what precise time, date and location?
EA: You look a bit confused my friend, must have been a rough ship travel from Europe I guess. To answer your question, you are in a popular saloon near Central Park. We have July 26th, 1884. Here, it is written on today’s newspaper.
JS: (grumbling to himself in a mixture of amazement and excitement) It worked!
EA: What worked?
JS: (not disclosing that he just arrived from the year 2017 by the mean of a time machine) Oh, I expected to find you here.
(shaking hands) Honored to finally meet you, Monsieur André. You’ve become a famous man in my hometown. And not only there of course.
EA: Well, thank you for that compliment. The book with my travel records of South America did indeed increase my notoriety a lot.
JS: (not disclosing that he read it in the future in a biography of Edouard André’s life) That is not of importance.
I read your 1879’s book “L’art des jardins” and I do have a lot of questions.
EA: Do you know that in New York’s Central Park, the architects were able to put their ideas into practice because they had more freedom of action on the new, rough terrain. They organized three independent networks of paths for cars, horseback riders and pedestrians, with numerous crossings over each other. The result was an astonishing multiplicity of bridges and tunnels, created at great expense, which have given the park a unique character.
JS: Do you have time for a coffee or two?
EA: With great pleasure. Please let us sit over there. Where is your hometown?
JS: Luxembourg
EA: Oh oui, I remember very well that ambitious project to build a complete new park on the remains of the dismantled fortress.
JS: Can we talk more specifically about Avenue de la Porte-Neuve? You redesigned that street.
EA: Absolutely, I remember well.
JS: The population estimate for Luxembourg-City in the current year 1884 is around 31 thousands people. Let us now pretend, there would be four times more people living there, what would be your commentary?
EA: The sidewalks are already quite crowded. And where to put much more horse-drawn carriages? With four times more people around, it seems difficult to imagine where to find more space for the walking crowd between Limpertsberg an the center of the city.
JS: But we can exclude that you would make the sidewalks on Avenue de la Porte-Neuve narrower than the 4 meters you put on each side?
EA: That would not be thinkable to me. Not with four times more people to accommodate.
JS: Good to hear that. Let us now imagine bicycles would become a popular and widely used mean of transportation. They would become safe and every person would be able to afford them and ride them. Would you approve these circulation rules inside the park of the Ville de Luxembourg? (Schmit shows André a map of the 2021 park rules with the mixed biking and walking paths, as well as with the paths reserved exclusively for one of both modes of motion)
EA: Well, what to say about this? The paths in my parks are on purpose not designed for good visibility around corners. This means that vegetation is explicitly a barrier to safety, when I think about bicycle riders moving around there in larger numbers and at considerable speeds. This is obviously a problem to me. Especially with people numbers increased 4-fold!
JS: (looking at his pocket watch) Monsieur André, I am afraid, I will now have to leave you. Adieu!
EA: So suddenly? Thank you for a very interesting conversation. Even if some parts of what we discussed seemed a bit extraordinary to me. Good bye. And the coffee is on me.
As he was already heading out of the hotel, Jean Schmit could not hear the last sentence anymore. He was in a real hurry now. During the conversation, he had completely forgotten to check his watch. The rendez-vous point in time and space for the time travel back did not suffer any delay.
Jean Schmit hailed a horse coach by waving with his hand.
“Please bring me to the nearest station of the Long Island Rail Road Company”.
Some endless minutes later, Schmit arrived at the ticket counter and asked for a ticket.
“How far are you going, Sir”, asked the clerk.
“Excellent question. For now, I need a ticket to go Shoreham. When will the next train arrive there?”
The clerk, without even looking up “If you catch the next train going out to Long Island, you will arrive in Shoreham around 10pm.”
Schmit was in trouble. He had been told to be that day in a specific venue in Shoreham before that time.
Boarding the train among the first passengers, Schmit now had no other option than get himself to the specified address and see what would happen.
Several hours later, the train finally arrived at a station nearby Shoreham. Schmit ran out of the station. No horse coaches around here. A boy offering to clean his shoes was the first person he saw.
“Young man, can you tell me how to get to Randall Road?”
“It is in that direction”, the boy points with his finger, “it is a 15 minutes walk”.
Schmit had a glance at his pocket watch, cursed, and started running.
He finally arrived at the address given to him and knocked at the door.
The door is opened and an assistant says “Welcome at Wardenclyffe. Mister Tesla is already expecting you. Please follow me, we have to hurry.”
Schmit rushed inside the building, which had all types of unusual and large technical equipment in the rooms they crossed.
“Mister Schmit, you are in big trouble”, Nikola Tesla immediately told him, “You had been told to be on time for this experiment. No delay whatsoever can be tolerated.”
“Well, let us not loose any further time”, Schmit stated.
Pointing to a machine in one part of the room, Nikola Tesla instructed Schmit to have a seat.
“This has never be done before. You are aware of the fact that no guarantee for any outcome can be given to you”, Tesla warned.
“Do your best, the jump in the future should be of 133 years”, Schmit insisted.
“Because we missed the right time frame, the precision of the jump in time cannot be guaranteed anymore. But I will only be able to make an estimate, when the experiment will have started.”
Schmit was indeed in deep trouble. “Let us start the procedure immediately!”, he ordered with insistence.
“As you wish, Sir”, Nikola Tesla replied, “but the risk is entirely up to you!”
Tesla nodded at his assistant, who pulled some levers on an large electric device. The sound of electric tension building up could soon be heard.
“Now!”, Tesla shouted. The assistant pushed a final button, and the room became illuminated for seconds by a blinding, white flash.
“Schmit is gone”, said the assistant when they regained their view in the room.
Tesla did some readings on his instruments, then looked at his assistant with a grim face, “According to my calculations, the jump forward in time will now be 164 years. Schmit is now headed for the year 2048, provided he will survive. It is too late to change anything.”
“What could kill him?”, the assistant asked.
“Well, ‘kill’ is not be the right expression. The paramount condition for him to arrive well in the year 2048 is that the targeted technical equipment for his arrival is still existing and in working condition. We have confirmation for the first two decades of the third millennium, but not for 2048. Should this not be the case, Schmit would find himself trapped for eternity in the corridors of time.”
With horror on their faces, Tesla and his assistant looked at the electric discharges fading away. Schmit had clearly disappeared from the year 1884. But would he arrive in 2048 alive?
They would probably never know.
Epilogue - Time travel and time capsules
We know that in the year 1896, a few years after the original boom in cycling, people started to complain about biking in the young City of Luxembourg’s park:
“I would have a small addition to make especially regarding the Veloce Club. In other cities, streets and paths have been designated which cyclists are obliged to follow. As today our park is frequented by people who often do not have very strong eyesight or who walk with difficulty, they are exposed to accidents due to the clumsiness or lightness of some velocipedists.”
— Complaint by counselor Warisse of City of Luxembourg in 1896
So Edouard André’s assessment proved to be right, even before the end of that century.
Is time travel real? Officially, of course not. Some Nikola Tesla fans might nevertheless leave space for doubt in their minds, the aura of the deceased inventor is still shining very bright up to the present time.
What we know for sure, time capsules are real! And they are not necessarily less mysterious.
In 2017, an archaeological team, who had done an analysis of clues found on Jule Verne’s tomb, discovered a 19th-century metallic box in the French Pyrenees. Once opened, the locked box revealed several historical artefacts. All metallic objects, a telescope, a triangle, a medieval coin, a simple ring, a necklace and a key, were found in a state of advanced oxidation. The box also contained a copy of a New York newspaper dating from 1890, with a story referencing Nellie Bly, who had managed to break the world record by traveling the world in 72 days, inspired by Jules Verne’s novel. It cannot be said with certainty that the objects belonged to Verne, but specialists believe that it must have been a least from someone in his closer entourage. It is speculated that several documents additionally found in the box might contain cryptograms or codes from an unknown secret society.
As a publicity stunt for a cognac manufacturer, John Malkovitch did in 2015 direct a movie that will only be released in the year 2115! The movie is accordingly named “100 Years: The Movie You’ll Never See”.
End credits and disclaimer
@luxembourgize is a road safety and biking activism account run and written by Jean Schmit (‘nom de guerre’). Follow him on Twitter and do not forget to use the hash tag #mvos365 as the binding glue for the everyday biking community on social media.
Do not attempt time travel on your own, it is a very hazardous activity. All the other factual information contained in this piece is real.
Jean Schmit might return or not to report about what he saw in the year 2048. Only time will tell. Please do apologize reduced activity on the Twitter feed in the meantime.
