The pneumatic tire celebrates its 125th birthday this year. These ubiquitous rubber rings are on every car, motorcycle and bicycle on the road today and revolutionized personal transport. 

Veterinarian John Dunlop invented the pneumatic tire in 1888 in Belfast, Ireland, when his son, Johnny, was riding a tri-cycle but found it difficult. John was worried about his safety and cut a rubber hose, stretched it over the wooden tires and covered it with a piece of linen. He inserted a valve and inflated it with a pump to create the first pneumatic tire. The legend goes that Johnny rode 60 miles on his new tires, and his father was granted a patent for the pneumatic tire 1888.

Dunlop's patent was later declared invalid when it was shown patents for pneumatic tires already existed in France since 1846 and the United States in 1847. What made Dunlop different is that he turned pneumatic tires into a commercial success first.

Dunlop made his earliest tires for bicycles and further developed the compound and design. He switched from a linen covering to canvas for more reliability. Dunlop opened his first factory to produce his tires in 1889 in Dublin. The first Dunlop factory in continental Europe was built in the German city of Hanau in 1893.

The first automotive tires were built in 1900, and Dunlop began building his first automotive tires in 1902. Dunlop began expanding the company in 1910 when he opened a rubber factory in Malaysia, and he added a tire factory in Japan in 1913. 

Dunlop made a major leap in tire technology in 1921 when it introduced the steel-belted radial tire. That was also the year John Dunlop died.

Source: Focus