Issue link: https://read.dmtmag.com/i/617259
54 nJanuary 2016n www.thunderpress.net by Kenzo It was 1895, the middle of the last decade of the 19th century and the height of the Gilded Age. In that pivotal year the fi rst moving picture projector was patented, the fi rst movie shown, and the fi rst movie theater built. The fi rst comic strip appeared in a newspaper and "America the Beautiful" was published. Emile Levassor won the fi rst Paris-Bordeaux- Paris auto race and Charles Duryea established America's fi rst auto fac- tory. This was the year that the fi rst intercollegiate basketball game took place, and the fi rst professional foot- ball game, and when volleyball was invented, but the biggest professional sport in America was bicycle racing. Who invented the motorcycle and when is the subject of vigorous debate. Some will proclaim it to be when Sylvester Roper presented his fi rst steam-powered velocipede, but moto-historians agree only that this took place sometime between 1867 and 1869. Others will claim that it was Michaux-Perreaux's steam velocipede that was fi rst, but again, all that can be agreed on is that it may have been as early as 1867 or as late as 1869. Some will fi rmly state that Daimler and Maybach built the fi rst one in 1885—it actually had four wheels— although the crude velocipede was intended to be only a test bed for their new internal combustion engine. A few will point out that Edward Butler was ahead of them all with his Petrol- Cycle, but, in fact, the fi rst test ride wasn't until 1888; meanwhile Karl Benz had been riding around the coun- tryside in his Motowagen by August of 1884. Of course, these last two had three wheels and some people still refuse to accept trikes as being motor- cycles. Depending upon how sticky you are about the defi nition of "motor- cycle," the fi rst were propelled by steam. Roper built at least several steam-powered bikes that were fueled by coal. The fi rst one was a "bone- shaker," a velocipede modeled after the 1863 invention of Pierre Micheau and/or Pierre Lallement, while the last was built into an 1895 Model 36 Columbia safety bicycle given to him by Albert Pope. Louis-Guillaume Perreaux attached his alcohol-fueled steam engine to a velocipede made by Pierre Micheau and in 1884 exhibited a three-wheel version. Petrol-fueled, steam-powered high-wheelers by George A. Long (c.1879) and Lucius Copeland (c.1881) would soon fol- low. While most of these machines have survived to the present era, none of them moved beyond being one-off custom builds. The January 12, 1895 issue of the Scientifi c American contained a short piece about a tricycle—more like a three-wheel carriage—powered by a 2 hp Golden Gate balanced gasoline engine built by A. Schilling & Sons in San Francisco, while the front cover of the February 9 issue showed an illus- tration for a two-wheel vehicle pow- ered by an internal combustion engine THE MOTORCYCLE IS BORN Two wheels in the Gilded Age Part I: The Concept The bicycle craze began with the high-wheelers in the 1880's. Bicycle construction would become the framework for experimentation with internal combustion engines. The Model 3 Benz was a commercial success. Since every transportation museum seems to own a replica, one must consider it to still be a success. The workshop of Gottlieb Diamler