Wagon. The wheel and the wagon were developed at the same time. This was at least 5,500 years ago, when people first discovered that they could pull sledges more easily if they fitted the sledges with wheels of solid wood.
The Mesopotamians were probably the earliest people to use wagons. The use of wagons spread quickly through much of Europe and central Asia. The Scythians wandered the plains of southeastern Europe as early as 700 B.C., carrying their possessions on two-wheeled carts covered with reeds. The Greeks and the Romans developed chariots that were lighter and faster than Egyptian chariots. The four-wheeled coach was developed in Germany during the Middle Ages.
English governors of the American Colonies introduced the first wagons in North America. Stagecoaches began to run over colonial roads about the time of George Washington. The prairie schooner (covered wagon), which was first built by the German farmers of Pennsylvania, was used in the development of the American West. Farm wagons carried crops to market until the early 1900’s. The present-day truck trailer is actually a kind of wagon.
