Before the multimillion-dollar contracts of the NBA, the global fervor of the FIFA World Cup, or the endorsement empires of modern Olympians, the world’s most lucrative and followed spectator sport was... walking.
In the 1870s and 1880s, a phenomenon known as pedestrianism swept across the United States and the United Kingdom. It involved men and women walking continuously around indoor dirt tracks for days at a time, pushing their bodies to the brink of collapse. While it sounds like a bizarre historical footnote, this grueling endurance sport actually created the blueprint for modern athletic celebrity, sports marketing, and stadium entertainment.
Here is a detailed look at how 19th-century competitive endurance walking laid the groundwork for the modern sports industry.
The Mechanics of the Sport
The pinnacle of pedestrianism was the Six-Day Race. Because Victorian Sabbath laws forbade public amusements on Sundays, competitors would begin walking just after midnight on Monday morning and walk continuously until midnight on Saturday. The goal was simple: cover the most miles. Elite walkers regularly surpassed 500 miles in a single six-day stretch.
The physical toll was horrifying. Competitors suffered from severe sleep deprivation, blistered feet, muscle spasms, and terrifying hallucinations. They would sleep for only a few hours a day in trackside tents, quickly roused by their trainers to get back on the track.
1. The Creation of the "Sports Superstar"
Before pedestrianism, sports were primarily local affairs, underground spectacles (like bare-knuckle boxing), or aristocratic pursuits (like horse racing). Pedestrianism was the first truly mass-market, working-class spectator sport, and it birthed the first modern sports superstars.
- Edward Payson Weston: The "Father of Pedestrianism," Weston was a master showman. He wore velvet capes, silk sashes, and carried a riding crop. He understood that skill wasn't enough; an athlete needed a persona.
- National and Ethnic Rivalries: Promoters quickly realized that rivalries sold tickets. When Weston (an American) faced off against Daniel O’Leary (an Irish immigrant), it ceased to be just a walking match; it became a proxy war of national and ethnic pride. This tapped into the tribalism that fuels modern sports fandom today.
2. The Birth of Sports Media and 24/7 Coverage
The rise of pedestrianism perfectly coincided with the expansion of the telegraph and the penny press. Newspapers provided breathless, around-the-clock coverage of the races. * The Daily Update: Just as modern fans check ESPN or Twitter for box scores, 19th-century fans bought multiple editions of daily newspapers to check the mileage tallies of their favorite walkers. * Human Interest Stories: Journalists didn’t just report the scores; they reported on what the athletes ate, how they slept, and their psychological breakdowns, creating the intimate parasocial relationship between fan and athlete that defines modern celebrity culture.
3. Merchandising, Endorsements, and Big Money
The financial structure of modern sports—prize money augmented by endorsements and merchandise—was pioneered on the dirt tracks of the 1870s. * Massive Purses: The prize money was staggering. A top pedestrian could earn $20,000 to $30,000 in a single race—equivalent to over $500,000 today. * Endorsements: Edward Payson Weston and his contemporaries endorsed boots, tonics, and clothing. Their faces appeared on trading cards (which predated baseball cards), and popular sheet music was written about them to be played in parlors across the country. * The Stadium Experience: Promoters transformed the arenas into full-scale entertainment zones. Brass bands played popular tunes to keep the walkers awake and the crowd engaged. Vendors hawked food, alcohol, and souvenirs. In fact, Madison Square Garden became the premier venue in America largely by hosting wildly profitable six-day walking races.
4. Breaking Racial and Gender Barriers
Because the sport was incredibly popular and highly lucrative, it offered a rare avenue for marginalized groups to achieve fame and wealth, a dynamic that remains central to the narrative of modern sports. * Black Athletes: Frank Hart, a Black Haitian immigrant, became one of the biggest stars in the sport. He broke the six-day world record in 1880, winning a massive sum of money and briefly becoming one of the most famous and highest-paid Black men in America. * Women's Sports: Female walkers, known as "pedestriennes," drew immense crowds. Women like Ada Anderson and Bertha von Hillern earned fortunes and challenged the prevailing Victorian medical consensus that women were too frail for physical exertion.
5. The Dark Side: Doping and Scandal
With massive sums of money and fame on the line, pedestrianism also laid the groundwork for the darker side of modern athletic celebrity. * Performance-Enhancing Drugs: To stay awake for days, walkers openly consumed coca leaves (cocaine), champagne, and even small doses of strychnine (which, in tiny amounts, acts as a stimulant). * Match-Fixing: Because gambling was heavily intertwined with the sport, allegations of athletes being paid off to throw races or feign injuries were rampant, foreshadowing the gambling scandals of modern athletics.
The Legacy
By the 1890s, pedestrianism died out. The invention of the "safety bicycle" made six-day bicycle races faster, more dangerous, and more exciting, and walking was relegated to the history books.
However, the infrastructure of the sport never left. Pedestrianism had proven that the public would pay exorbitant amounts of money to watch highly trained individuals push their bodies to the limit. It established the template of the stadium spectacle, the media-driven rivalry, the lucrative endorsement deal, and the athlete-as-entertainer. Every modern athlete who signs a shoe contract, stars in a commercial, or plays to a sold-out arena is walking in the exhausted, blistered footsteps of the 19th-century pedestrians.