I read about the “skeedaddlehopper” in this morning’s NY Times. This article is about an invention based on a rickshaw parading the streets in Woodstock, NY, made by a man blowing a ram’s horn to notify people to get out of the way, and pulling “Magic Ben” and “Dangerous Dan the Bongo Man” behind him.  He, the driver or the puller, has designed a craft that is balanced so he can at times going downhill can reach 25 miles an hour with him levered airborne for 100 feet at a time.  You can’t get much better than that.

What is significant about this invention is that it is human powered.  Of course, like most rickshaws the puller (some have the driver push from the back between two poles) usually only has one or two passengers and does not get to rise into the air for the driver.  But, the inventor, Darin Selby, tinkered with the basic design and came up with a delightful variant, albeit questionably lawful.

Mr. Selby, or Sage as he is also known, has invented other interesting items. “The Huggety-wheeled Roller”, a bicycle that is steered with the elbows, and the still-conceptual “Lumpy Bumpy Telescope” which imprints starlight onto water are but two of them.  He lives in the back of the rickshaw by throwing a tarp over it at night.

I like his focus.  He got into the rickshaw business to protest the pollution of fuel driven vehicles.  He questions “the ingrained primacy of the destructive polluting automobile.” If you have rickshaws you get rid of the noise of engines and the rush and danger of a thousand or more pounds of metal hurtling through the streets.  You give jobs to people who can get exercise and fresh air by pulling others who can pay for the privilege.  It makes a kind of sense although in Woodstock he was pulled off the street because of safety factors.

I also like his solution of installing a brake system using hemp-oil brake fluid and think his weatherproof hemp-canvas top is pointedly making a point. He calls his shoes his “Flintstone-stoppers” and can make as much as $200.00 a weekend in “donations”. Otherwise, the life of the inventor of the Skeedaddlehopper is not so much a monetary success as it is a traffic stopper and object of great interest because he rises to the occasion.

There should be room in our world for quirky people. I like to envision Sage pulling Magic Dan and Dangerous Dan the Bongo Man in his human powered rickshaw that is balanced so that he can rise into the air while blowing that ram’s horn to warn people he is coming.