It's all fun.

How the Penny
got its name

Each year, in both the annual Oak Bay Tea Party Parade and Victoria Day Parade, local businessman Matt MacNeil loved watching an antique Penny Farthing bicycle skillfully maneuvered by well known local Jack Leonard. Jack rode his bike at the head of the Oak Bay Tea Party Parade for 55 years, where his participation was a Victoria tradition. While admiring Jack's ability to handle his machine, Matt MacNeil had a flash of inspiration: the authentic English pub that he dreamed of opening some day would be called The Penny Farthing Pub!

Wondering what became of Jack Leonard's original handmade Penny Farthing bike? The next time you drop in, you can spy it in its place of honour.

What is a
Penny Farthing?

The Penny Farthing Pub takes its name from the innovative bicycle of the 1870's with an impossibly large front wheel coupled with a miniscule rear wheel. The immense height of the front wheel meant that the rider perched high above the street in order to both ride and control the bicycle.

The name of the bicycle comes from two low value historical British coins: the Penny, a large heavy round coin, and a Farthing (worth a quarter Penny), a much smaller and lighter round coin. The silhouette of the Penny Farthing bicycle has come to represent the whimsical ambience and adventurous, playful spirit of the late Victorian period and turn of the 19th century.