Before the wheel was invented

While the world was slowly getting used to the idea that all of mankind should eventually be put on gas-powered wheels, other forms of transport kept their utility and local charm. A milkman in Bruges before World War I. (Postcard from Albert Sugg).

Sunday at the countryside

Before huge numbers of cars would swarm our roads and transform the landscape forever, cycling must have been a carefree and above all safe passtime - provided you could handle the cobblestones and dirt roads. In this 1896 shot members of the Buysse family are portrayed, wearing their Sunday best, with their bicycles in Ename. The novelist Cyriel Buysse is seen on the right.
(Collection of Buysse-Verschoore. Photo by Ach. Sacré-Smits).

Those magnificent men....

The French aviation pioneer Henri Farman demonstrated flights in Ghent in May-June 1908. In these competitive early years when flying still had the allure of a freak show and was synonymous with slow, short, and above all frightfully dangerous, progress was measured in meters. Farman's visit to Ghent, however, does enjoy the historical distinction to include the first flight with a (living) passenger on board.
(Postcard with photo by Théo De Graeve).

It happened at the World's Fair

Flying was still a dream for most in 1913, yet these ladies came a bit closer to the real thing by posing, dressed up to the nines, in a make-believe aircraft in a photographer's studio at the Ghent World's Fair.
(Photographer unknown).

Automobiles and oil lamps

The bigger models of automobiles in the early 1920's were equipped with a spare tire, horn, utensils box, an oil lamp on the side, and a driver to operate it all. The softer oil lamps were apparently used at night, once it had been discovered that the flashes of the headlamps could scare cattle as well as blind other drivers.
(Collection of François Nowé, photographer unknown)

Out of Africa

The lawyer and future minister of the Colonies for the Belgian Liberal Party Robert Godding travelled in 1927 to and in the Belgian-Congo. Considering the less than optimal state of the road infrastructure as well as of the materiel, this must have been quite an epic undertaking. His wife Hélène Bauss poses on the way to Binga, which is located some merciless 950 kms from Leopoldville (today's Kinshasha) - as the crow flies.
(Collection of Robert Godding. Photo by Godding).

Elisabethville

This ocean liner of the Compagnie Belge Maritime du Congo connected Antwerp with Matadi in Congo from the 1920's through World War II. Before the breakthrough of intercontinental aviation, the ocean remained the main artery between the homeland and its colony. The SS Elisabethville was launched in 1921 and could transport some 700 passengers. Photo taken in 1939 by Henri Guillaume.
(Collection of Henri Guillaume).

Blood railway

The construction of a railway line connecting Matadi, the main port for maritime shipping, with the capital Leopoldville appeared, due to the absence of navigable rivers, early on the agenda of the Belgian colonial rulers. It took nonetheless a lot of blood, toil, tears, and sweat to complete the 366 kms between 1890 and 1898. The locomotive that inaugurated the first stretch in 1893 was preserved as a holy relic.
(Collection of Henri Guillaume. Photo from 1947 by A. da Cruz for Congopresse).

Heart of darkness

In Belgian-Congo the sprawling rivers of the Congo river system were essential for opening up the massive hinterland, transporting people and goods.
(Collection of Henri Guillaume. Photo by Henri Guillaume c. 1937-40).

Not quite their finest hour

As a result of the quick collapse of the Allied Forces in Northern France in May-June 1940, plenty of equipment was destroyed or had to be left behind in the hands of the German invaders, as this Hurricane fighter plane of the Royal Air Force’s 4th Squadron somewhere in France. Abandoned planes like this would be sorely missed during the Battle of Britain the following summer.
(From a series of German photos taken during the German advance in Belgium and Northern France, May-June 1940. Photographer unknown.)

A family car

When going with the family on holidays, you better make sure to have a large trunk. Yet if you could afford a posh 1947 Pontiac Streamliner with its characteristic triple "speed line" chrome spears on the fender, you were good to go.
(Collection of François Nowé, photographer unknown).

A limo for the minister

The Belgian minister of Public works and Reconstruction Adolphe Van Glabbeke (1954-1955) sets an example with his stylish Buick Roadmaster 1954.
(Collection of Adolphe Van Glabbeke, photographer unknown).

The scooter

The success of Italian and Hollywood films in the 1950's contributed to the popularization of the scooter. It was cool to be driven on the backseat of a Vespa or here a Lambretta LC 125 - albeit preferably not by your grandma. (Photographer unknown).

Opening of the first Belgian expressway (1956)

At the time of the inauguration of the first Belgian expressway Brussels-Ostend (E 40) in 1956, the concept of a highway especially planned for high-speed traffic with limited access points, no intersections, and divided lanes was still relatively new and initially met with great scepticism as to its usefulness. It was under the liberal minister of Public works Omer Vanaudenhove (1955-61) that the first 100 kms connecting Brussels with the coast were finally completed.
(Collection of Omer Vanaudenhove. Photo by the Ministry of Public works).

Car is king (1958)

While issues like traffic congestion and pollution in urban areas are dominating today's thinking, back in the 1950's the car was king and elaborate heavy-engineering measures were undertaken to serve the king. In Brussels, an urban expressway (the Small Ring) around the historical centre was completed in time for the Expo 1958. It intended to increase the accessibility by car and give the city a modern appearance.
(Collection of Omer Vanaudenhove. Photo by Les Frères Haine).

Travelling first class

This flyer published by the Belgian national airline Sabena in the 1950's highlights the specifications and facilities of the Super DC-6 airliner, including separate women's and men's lounges. In these enthusiastic days before mass tourism, the appeal of airline companies was just as much boosted by focusing on leisure and comfort, as it was on safety.