The term “fifth wheel” refers to something unnecessary, but its origin is from the Martin Rocking Fifth Wheel, a useful invention in 1911 for attaching trucks to trailers. The design is still used today, but the term may have originated from spare wheels on stagecoaches. The term has retained its original context and also refers to unimportant roles in organizations.
The term “fifth wheel” is one of many idiomatic expressions used in everyday English and refers to something that is not essential, or is unnecessary and unnecessary. Paradoxically, the term purportedly originates from a useful invention in 1911 by US inventor Charles Martin of the Martin Rocking Fifth Wheel, which was a small horizontal wheel installed on trucks with trailers attached that was the primary mechanism for attaching the truck to the trailer. The first gasoline trucks were actually farm tractors attached to previously horse-drawn wagons, and the fifth wheel coupler was a round plate with a hole in the center that Martin invented to secure the units together.
The same basic Martin fifth wheel design is still used today on modern semi-trailer trailers used extensively in road haulage. The Martin Rocking Fifth Wheel was revolutionary at the time, as it allowed trucks to lean as they rounded corners and handle uneven surfaces without the trailer or truck wheels losing contact with the ground. It has been so useful that all major truck manufacturers have adopted the design.
English sayings often have origins that are difficult to trace and it is not entirely clear whether Martin’s invention was the original source of the term “fifth wheel” or just the method which made the idiom a common saying in everyday speech. The meaning that it has been transmitted through time suggests that it may have origins further back in the invention of the stagecoach in the western United States, or even further back in time. A horse-drawn stagecoach, like a modern automobile, often carried a spare fifth wheel on long journeys, which was of little use unless an accident occurred with damage to one of the vehicle’s main wheels.
One type of stagecoach used for travel carried up to 18 passengers in the United States during the mid-1800s and was actually called a 5th-Wheel Touring Wagon. The stagecoaches themselves, however, had their origins in the invention of the two-wheeled chariot, which can be traced back to 3000 BC in the Mesopotamia region of present-day Iraq. Horse-drawn carriages began to proliferate in design and versatility in 16th-century Europe, when long-distance enclosed carriage travel became popular. The suspension has been added to make the ride more comfortable, as have the seat cushions. It may be around this time that these vehicles began carrying spare wheels and the term “fifth wheel” originated.
The meaning of idioms evolves over time, but the term “fifth wheel” is unique in that it appears to have retained its original context. The widespread use of Martin’s invention in highway trucking has apparently had little effect on the term which still retains the connotation of something of only peripheral importance. The meaning has in fact come to mean more than just technology or spare parts of little everyday value, but also involve the roles that people play. Someone said to be a fifth wheel in a company or other organization is someone who is considered unimportant, or whose duties do not have much impact on current affairs and could easily be done without.
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