Foster Powell is easily first among the pedestrians. He was an eighteenth century notability, a native of Horsforth, near Leeds, and born in 1734. Articled to an attorney, he remained a solicitor’s clerk, undistinguished in the law, but early famed for his walking powers. In 1764 he backed himself for any amount to walk fifty miles on the Bath Road in seven hours, and having accomplished this, despite his wearing a heavy greatcoat and leather breeches at the time, he visited France and Switzerland, and fairly walked the natives off their legs. It was in 1773 that he performed his first walk from London to York and back, doing the 400 miles in five days and eighteen hours. This was followed by a walk of 100 miles, out and home, on the Bath Road, done in twenty-three hours and a quarter. His three great pedestrian records on the Great North Road in 1788 and twice in 1792 are his most remarkable achievements. Although by this time he had long passed the age at which athletics are commonly indulged in, he performed the London to York and back walk of 1788 in five days twenty hours, and its repetitions of 1792 in five days eighteen hours and five days fifteen hours and a quarter, respectively. The starting and turning-points were Shoreditch Church and York Minster. This last effort probably cost him his life, for he died, aged fifty-nine, early the following year. Powell figures—rightly enough—as one of Wilson and Caulfield’s company of “Remarkable Characters,” in which he is described as about five feet nine inches in height, close-knit body, of a sallow complexion, and of a meagre habit. He lived on a light and spare diet, and generally abstained from drink, only on one of his expeditions partaking of brandy. He took but little sleep, generally five hours. [Picture: Foster Powell] Robert Barclay of Ury, born 1731, died 1797, walked from London to Ury, 510 miles, in ten days. He is described as having been well over six feet in height. He married, in 1776, Sarah Ann Allardice, and was the father of the next notable pedestrian.