Pierre Giffard

) was a French journalist, a pioneer of modern political reporting, a newspaper publisher and a prolific sports organizer.

In 1891, he created the Bordeaux-Paris cycle race, then Paris-Brest-Paris. In the same year he organised the Paris-Belfort running race. In 1894 he ran the Paris-Rouen and in 1896 created the Paris marathon, the Marathon de Paris.

As editor of the sports daily, le Vélo, his opposition to the car-maker Albert de Dion over the Dreyfus affair led de Dion to create a rival daily, L'Auto, which in 1903 created the Tour de France.

Biography

Pierre Giffard's father was a lawyer and mayor in Fontaine-le-Dun. Pierre was taught from the age of six by Father Biville at St Laurent en Caux and from eight at the Lycée Corneille in Rouen. He completed his schooling in Paris, at the Lycée Charlemagnete in the Marais district. It was there that he developed his ideas as a republican.

The Prussian-German war started in 1870 and Giffard enrolled in the army, with his parents' reluctant permission, at Fontaine-le-Dun in Haute-Normandie. He joined the reserve army in November at Le Havre. There, following the custom of the time, he was elected an officer. He became a lieutenant on 10 December 1870. At the end of the war he resumed his studies at Douai, where he gained a university degree in August 1871.

Giffard's father died on 1 August 1872. Pierre moved to Paris to work as a journalist.

Journalism

Between 1873 and 1878 he worked for Le Corsaire, L'Evènement, La France, Le Gaulois, Le Petit Parisien, La Lanterne and finally Le Figaro, which he joined on the strength of his reports of the World Exhibition in Paris and of conferences he organised there concerning the invention of the telephone and telegraph.

He reported for Le Figaro in Switzerland, Belgium, Germany, Italy, Greece, Austria, Scotland, Algeria, Tunisia, Malta, Cyprus, Spain, Holland and Denmark. He reported on the attack by French troops on Bou-Hamama in Algeria and the taking of Sfax in Tunisia, and the arrival of the British fleet at Alexandria and the departure of the French navy.

Press chief and event organizer

In 1891 he ran the first Bordeaux-Paris for the paper, then Paris-Brest-Paris, followed by the Paris-Belfort running race. In 1892, he was appointed to the Légion d'Honneur.

On 22 July 1894, he organised a car race from Paris to Rouen for the paper. It's considered the first true car race that wasn't a time-trial.

In 1896, he joined his colleague Paul Rousseau at the head of the newspaper, Le Vélo, where he wrote under the name Arator. There on 19 July 1896 he organised the first Paris marathon and helped found the Automobile Club de France. In 1900, he was promoted to officer of the Légion d'Honneur. It was also at this time that he wrote opinions that led indirectly to the start of the Tour de France (see below).

Politics, return to reporting and writing

Giffard stood in the national election of March 1900, a candidate in the 2nd constituency of Seine-Inférieure (Yvetôt). He failed, victim of Albert de Dion, who distributed Giffard's book, La Fin du Cheval (see below), claiming it to be Giffard's political program. Giffard returned to journalism until 1902 and joined Matin, which sent him to the Far East to cover the Russia-Japan war.

He came back to Paris, ill, in July 1904. He worked for several papers, including Dépêche Coloniale and Petit Marseillais. He also began writing novels. In June 1906, now one of the senior journalists of France, he went back to Le Figaro and reported the first meeting of the Russian parliament, the Douma.

Pierre Giffard died on 21 January 1922 at Maisons-Laffitte, where he lived.

The origins of the Tour de France [l'Equipe le 16/10/2000, Jacques Marchand]

Le Vélo, the country's biggest sports daily, threw itself in support of Alfred Dreyfus. France was divided over the justice of his trial for selling military secrets to the Germans. The paper's largest advertiser, de Dion, believed Dreyfus guilty and removed his advertising from the paper. He launched a rival paper, at first called L'Auto-Vélo and then simply L'Auto.

A circulation war broke out between the two papers. Le Vélo's biggest publicity stunt was the race that Giffard had created, Paris-Brest-Paris. De Dion ordered his editor, Henri Desgrange, to run a still longer race.

Organising a race longer than the 1,200km of Paris-Brest-Paris was not an easy demand. On 19 December 1902, one of his reporters, Géo Lefèvre, suggested a Tour de France. The first Tour was in 1903 and Le Vélo disappeared in 1904. Giffard joined Desgrange's staff.

Pierre Giffard and La Petite Reine

The phrase "la petite reine" has passed into the French language as a term for a bicycle. The origins are in 1891, when Giffard wrote a history of bicycle development, "La Reine Bicyclette". [Giffard, Pierre 1891: La Reine Bicyclette, Firmin-Didot, 1891 ] The expression was made more emblematic by the picture on the cover, of a young woman wearing a modern bicycle as a crown. The title was intended to describe the sprit that the bicycle had brought to her life. Cycling enthusiasts adopted the name, calling their machine "la petite reine".

Outstanding books

Le Sieur de Va-Partout

Le Sieur de Va-Partout was the first French book in a new style, the literature of reporting, and therefore of a new type of author: the writer-reporter. [Giffard, Pierre, Le Sieur de Va-Partout, un premier manifeste de la littérature de reportage, Presse et plumes. Journalisme et littérature au XIXe siècle, pub: Nouveau Monde Editions, 2005 (pp 511-521) ]

La fin du cheval

This was Giffard's thesis on the inevitable replacement of the horse by the bicycle, then by the car. It was illustrated by Albert Robida.

La guerre infernale

An adventure novel for children, published as a serial, an edition appearing every Saturday. It was illustrated by Albert Robida. It described the second world war, years before it happened, describing an attack on London by the Germans and war between Japan and the United States. It was subsequently republished as a book.

References