Antique Bikes and Motorcycle History

On August 26, in 1917, Alan Bedell left Los Angeles, California on his Henderson motorcycle arriving in New York City (3,296 miles) in seven days, sixteen hours and fifteen minutes later, breaking the record set by “Cannonball” Baker on an Indian Twin. The Henderson suffered just one flat tire, went through three sets of Champion […]

Brisbane’s Gallery of Modern Art (GOMA) opens the world exclusive exhibition ‘The Motorcycle: Design, Art, Desire’ tomorrow, featuring 100 exceptional motorcycles from the 1870s to the present. Queensland Art Gallery, Gallery of Modern Art (QAGOMA) Director Chris Saines said ‘The Motorcycle’, showing until 26 April, 2021 celebrates 150 years of motorcycle history and included multiple

A quick internet search under ‘Triumph logo’ offers a testimony to the power of the bike manufacturer’s logo. Whether it’s spelled out in the red, white and blue of the Union flag, the simplified black ‘smile line’ Triumph moniker or the more recent triangle treatment, it’s a brand that is loved by riders and non-riders

This bike is deceiving. Mistakenly restored by one of the high masters of vehicle restorations, Steve Huntzinger, it conceals its heritage. It currently looks like a select piece of Fabergé jewelry, which conceals the magnificent history. You are forced to test your imagination as you think about this used spindly, almost a bicycle, 1908 Indian

I haven’t been to Wildwood since I was 7 or 8 years old. My memories include lots of jellyfish in the water, and having to walk “forever” just to get to the water – not quite like our usual beaches in Seaside or Ship Bottom. Since I’m sidelined for a few months with “medically induced motorcycle emptiness”,

    On 4th September 1969, a film was released in the United Kingdom that would have more effect on our little world of custom motorcycling than any other. It was, of course, Easy Rider.   Almost exactly fifty years later, it still resonates with us, although its language and ethos may have dated over

  You might remember that back in October 2011 Jay Leno, Late Nite TV icon and motorhead extraordinaire, helped introduce the new 6-cylinder K1600 BMW flagship. Taking it one historical leap further, during one of his highly successful (multi -million views) Leno’s Garage YouTube Channel episodes, Jay recently helped spotlight another unique and innovative K

Motorcycles have been going to war as long as there have been motorcycles …and if you had a war to go to, motorcycles would get you there often faster and once there capable of traversing terrain inaccessible to other vehicles. By the beginning of the 1900s, motorcycle production was a worldwide phenomenon establishing iconic marques

This story contains some of the masters of the antique motorcycle history realm, including Mike Parti, who restored it; Don Whalen who brokered it; Bud Ekins, who found it; Mike Bahnmaier who bought it from Mike, and of course, Von Dutch. It also involves Markus Cuff, the willing photographic master, American Iron Magazine, and the

    When asked to pick my favorite antique bike, I immediately faced two dilemmas. One, I couldn’t pick just one. Maybe I could narrow it down to a Top Ten Fav’s after much gnashing over 100s of outstanding machines. Then another issue with the assignment, about the designation…antique. People toss about different time frames

I receive a strange call from time to time. “Meet me in Monrovia at 4:00 a.m.” The voice came in low tones. I arrived on a dark street, just down from a parked black-and-white. A decoy to keep local petty thieves on their toes, I locked the Bikernet van next to it, scrambled a block

  You can spot a vintage Indian board tracker racer a mile away thanks to its drooping handlebars as well as spindly “hardtail” bicycle type frame and narrow 2 ¼ inch tires. With clutchless ferocious motors and minus brakes, you counted on your feet when trying to come to a stop after 100+ mph. A

We are going to attempt to bring Bandit’s Cantina members more classics coupled with historic info. We need to be culturally balanced between wild shit, boobs, and something from the other side of the tracks; namely, historic motorcycles. We are very fortunate to bring you a Steve McQueen-owned 1935 Indian Chief from the La Quay

      Many consider the Crocker the Holy Grail of historic motorcycles, perhaps worthy of an Indiana Jones. Tales include Crocker hunters fleeing spear tossing natives in remote Pacific islands on the rumor of a machine left there during WWII. Earlier in 2014 a pair of original V-twin Crockers, one Big and one Small

    It was 1911 when brothers Tom and William started in the manufacturing business. They built their first four cylinder motorcycle in 1912 with a long wheelbase. The ads of the day stated “The long wheelbase of the Henderson, 65 inches, permits the riders to sit between the wheels, reducing road shocks to the

There’s that old, often used joke/question? Why did the chicken cross the road? There’s all kinds of answers aka punch lines. In the case of Jeff Rogers, it took a bit of a spin, the question going, “Why did the Peacock cross the road?” His answer would be, “Well, it didn’t.” Seem Jeff, hailing from

    Launching its first motorcycle in 1904, the Feilbach enterprise would eventually knock heads, SOHC or otherwise, with another Milwaukee upstart company, Harley-Davidson, although it seemed Feilbach had the upper hand with a better motorcycle. Arthur Otto Feilbach and his brother William tinkered together their first machine within their small home garage.  This was

    Editor’s Note: Our author, Louise Ann Noeth (aka “Landspeed” Louise), is a long-time SAH member and a two-time SoCal Chapter Valentine Award winner. The following is a fresh version of her article summarizing racing at Bonneville in anticipation of its centennial, now from the perspective of actually having reached that centennial. The entire

    Okay, we gotta admit it’s a tiny bit macabre to find a stellar group of antique, vintage and high performance motorcycles on display at a cemetery, literally the last place a bike fan wants to visit.  But there was lively reasoning behind the appearance of 13 “celebrity” two-wheelers at the Forest Lawn Memorial

    The 1912 catalog from the Miami Cycle & Manufacturing Company in Middleton Ohio touts the company’s Flying Merkel motorcycle as “The Only Motorcycle with a Spring Frame and a Spring Fork.”         While the Flying Merkel is one of the most sought-after antiques around today, in 1912, it was just

    Even back in the early 1970s, it was easy to see Roger McGrath was going places…fast!   There’s a well-earned Ph.D. listed after Roger McGrath’s name, something you’ll notice whenever reading his bio found often across the Internet. You could say he’s been there, done that.  It includes military experience as a Marine

    This is a story of motorcycle sibling rivalry that went down a few years ago and now is worth retelling as 2013 winds down, the tale told by Glen Bator of Bator International. Case in point, two 1939 Crocker Big Tank V-twins, consecutively numbered 106 and 107. They even have names: The Black

Have a 45 Flathead with your Sunday Morning Coffee My friends always say to me that I have a great job, always on the road, shooting beautiful motorcycles, women, and action, and modest me always replies, “It’s a lot of work and long hours,” and it is, but there is no place on Earth that

If you loved V-twins, New Zealand must have been ”Hog Heaven” back in 1943. Suddenly we had shiploads of US military Harley-Davidson motorcycles, swarming up and down Auckland’s Queen St and Wellington’s Lambton Quay. But by about 1945 they’d almost all vanished, taken home by our departing American allies. The Marines and GIs were a