The history of steam road vehicles comprises the development of vehicles powered by a steam engine for use on land and independent of rails, whether for conventional road use, such as the steam car and steam waggon, or for agricultural or heavy haulage work, such as the traction engine.
The first experimental vehicles were built in the 18th and 19th century, but it was not until after Richard Trevithick had developed the use of high-pressure steam, around 1800, that mobile steam engines became a practical proposition. The first half of the 19th century saw great progress in steam vehicle design, and by the 1850s it was viable to produce them on a commercial basis. This progress was dampened by legislation which limited or prohibited the use of steam-powered vehicles on roads. Nevertheless, the 1880s to the 1920s saw continuing improvements in vehicle technology and manufacturing techniques, and steam road vehicles were developed for many applications. In the 20th century, the rapid development of internal combustion engine technology led to the demise of the steam engine as a source of propulsion of vehicles on a commercial basis, with relatively few remaining in use beyond the Second World War.
Many of these vehicles were acquired by enthusiasts for preservation, and numerous examples are still in existence. In the 1960s, the air pollution problems in California gave rise to a brief period of interest in developing and studying steam-powered vehicles as a possible means of reducing the pollution. Apart from interest by steam enthusiasts, occasional replica vehicles, and experimental technology, no steam vehicles are in production at present.
Early steam-powered vehicles, which were uncommon but not rare, have considerable disadvantages as seen from a 21st-century viewpoint. They were slow to start, as water had to be boiled to generate the steam. They used a dirty fuel (coal) and put out dirty smoke. Fuel was bulky and had to be shoveled onto the vehicle and then into the firebox. Like a furnace, hot ash had to be removed and disposed of. The engine needed to be replenished with water in addition to fuel. Most vehicles had metal wheels and less than excellent traction. They were heavy. In most cases the user had to do their own maintenance. Top speed was low, about 20 miles (32km) per hour, and acceleration was poor.
Steam vehicle technology evolved over time. Later steam vehicles used cleaner liquid fuel (kerosene), were fitted with rubber tyres and condensers to recover water, and were lighter overall. These improvements were not enough to keep pace with internal-combustion engines, however, which ultimately out-competed steam and remained dominant for the rest of the 20th century.
Early research on the steam engine before 1700 was closely linked to the quest for self-propelled vehicles and ships, the first practical applications from 1712 were stationary plant working at very low pressure which entailed engines of very large dimensions. The size reduction necessary for road transport meant an increase in steam pressure with all the attendant dangers, due to the inadequate boiler technology of the period. A strong opponent of high pressure steam was James Watt who along with Matthew Boulton did all he could to dissuade William Murdoch from developing and patenting his steam carriage built and operated in model form in 1784. In 1791 he built a larger steam carriage which he had to abandon to do other work.[1]
During the latter part of the 18th century, there were numerous attempts to produce self-propelled steerable vehicles. Many remained in the form of models. Progress was dogged by many problems inherent to road vehicles in general, such as adequate road surfaces, suitable power plant giving steady rotative motion, tyres, vibration resistant bodywork, braking, suspension and steering among other issues. The extreme complexity of these issues can be said to have hampered progress over more than a hundred years, as much as hostile legislation.
Verbiest steam carriage
Steam carriage by Verbiest of 1679
Ferdinand Verbiest is suggested to have built what may have been the first steam carriage in about 1679, but very little concrete information on this is known to exist. It was not designed to carry a driver or goods as it was a small scale vehicle.[2][3] It also seems that the Belgian vehicle served as an inspiration for the Italian Grimaldi (early 1700) and the French Nolet (1748) steam carriage successor.[4]
Cugnot "Fardier à vapeur"
Cugnot's "Fardier à vapeur" ("Steam wagon") of 1769
Nicolas-Joseph Cugnot's "machine à feu pour le transport de wagons et surtout de l'artillerie" ("fire engine for transporting wagons and especially artillery") was built in two versions, one in 1769 and one in 1771 for use by the French Army. This was the first steam wagon that was not a toy, and that was known to exist. Cugnot's fardier a term usually applied to a massive two wheeled cart for exceptionally heavy loads, was intended to be capable of transporting 4 tonnes (3.9 tons), and of travelling at up to 4km/h (2.5mph). The vehicle was of tricycle layout, with two rear wheels and a steerable front wheel controlled by a tiller. There is considerable evidence, from the period, that this vehicle actually ran, making it probably the first to do so, however it remained a short lived experiment due to inherent instability and the vehicle's failure to meet the Army's specified performance level.[5]
A British patent No.1674 of December 1788 was granted for a steam car by Fourness and Ashworth.[7]
Trevithick steam carriage
A replica of Trevithick's 1801 road locomotive Puffing DevilTrevithick's London Steam Carriage of 1803
In 1801 Richard Trevithick constructed an experimental steam-driven vehicle (Puffing Devil) which was equipped with a firebox enclosed within the boiler, with one vertical cylinder, the motion of the single piston being transmitted directly to the driving wheels by means of connecting rods. It was reported as weighing 1520kg fully loaded, with a speed of 14.5km/h (9.0mph) on the flat. During its first trip it was left unattended and was "self destructed". Trevithick soon built the London Steam Carriage that ran successfully in London in 1803, but the venture failed to attract interest and soon folded up.
In the context of Trevithick's vehicle, an English writer by the name of "Mickleham" in 1822 coined the term Steam engine:
"It exhibits in construction the most beautiful simplicity of parts, the most sagacious selection of appropriate forms, the most convenient and effective arrangement and connexion uniting strength with elegance, the necessary solidity with the greatest portability, possessing unlimited power with a wonderful pliancy to accommodate it to the varying resistance: it may indeed be called The steam engine."[8]
Evans steam-powered amphibious craft
The Oruktor amphibolos by Evans of 1805
In 1805 Oliver Evans built the Oruktor amphibolos (literally Amphibious digger), a steam-powered, flat bottomed dredger that he modified to be self-propelled on both water and land. It is widely believed to be the first amphibious vehicle, and the first steam-powered road vehicle to run in the United States. However, no designs for the machine survive, and the only accounts of its achievements come from Evans himself. Later analysis of Evans's descriptions suggests that the 5hp (3.7kW) engine was unlikely to have been powerful enough to move the vehicle either on land or water, and that the chosen route for its demonstration would have had the benefit of gravity, river currents and tides to assist with the vehicles' progress. The dredger was not a success, and after a few years lying idle, was dismantled for parts.[9]
Summers and Ogle steam carriage
In around 1830 or 1831 Summers and Ogle based at the Iron Foundry, Millbrook, Southampton, made two three-wheeled steam carriages.[10]
In 1831 the firm's Nathaniel Ogle gave evidence on the steam carriage to the "Select Committee of the House of Commons on Steam Carriages".[11][12]
In 1832 one of their steam carriages travelled via Oxford to Birmingham and Liverpool.[10][13]
A June 1833 newspaper report described a demonstration in London:[14]
On Saturday last Mr Nathaniel Ogle, accompanied by several ladies, together with Mr G Burdett, Mr Macgary, Mr C Bischoff, Mr Babbage and other gentlemen, proceeded by his steam carriage from the Bazaar in King street, Portman square to call on Mr Rothschild at his residence at Stamford hill. The vehicle, although it has been rattled over the roads nearly six hundred miles, is in efficient condition. A small quantity of waste steam was perceptible at first, until the boilers and casing were hot. The distance, full seven miles, was cleared, not withstanding the crowded state of the roads, in thirty one minutes, and the sudden and narrow ascent to Mr Rothschild's made with perfect precision, which was hardly to be expected from so long and ponderous a vehicle. The party was most urbanely and kindly received by Mrs and Mr Rothschild, and after having partaken of refreshments returned to Baker street.
Early steam carriage services
Hancock's Enterprise steam bus of 1833Russell's steam carriage with boiler below the axle and two pistons in 1834
More commercially successful for a time than Trevithick's carriage were the steam carriage services operated in England in the 1830s, principally by associates of Sir Goldsworthy Gurney and by Walter Hancock among others and in Scotland by John Scott Russell. However, the heavy road tolls imposed by the Turnpike Acts discouraged steam road vehicles and for a short time allowed the continued monopoly of horse traction until railway trunk routes became established in the 1840s and 1850s.
Sir James C. Anderson and his engineering partner Jasper Wheeler Rogers were the first to bring steam-propulsion vehicles to Ireland. Rogers and Anderson created their versions of these devices in the 1830s and early 1840s where they advocated for an island-wide conveyance network that would utilize Ireland's mail coach roads. An 1838 Cork Southern Reporter article on Anderson's "steam drag, or carriage for common roads" recounts how Anderson and his father (both of Buttevant Castle) spent "a fortune in building twenty-nine unsuccessful carriages to succeed in the thirtieth." Jasper Rogers built his Irish steam-driven cars in a former flint-glass factory, Fort Chrystal, located on what is now known as Dublin's East Wall.
Accompanying Rogers' and Anderson's interests in improvements in Irish conveyance of goods and people, they particularly advocated steam-propelled individual vehicles because the operators, road network staff, and work crews needed to maintain the system were much more encompassing than those utilized by a railway system alone, at a time when Rogers and Anderson were trying to maximize Irish wage employment. They could see that their immediate competitor, the railway, would greatly diminish labor needs within Ireland's transportation infrastructures. Similarly, a national railway system would contract, rather than expand, inner-island travel destinations. Rogers' and Anderson's steam-vehicle system called for numerous way-stations for refueling and supplying fresh water, and at the same time, these stations could house a "road police" as well as telegraph depots. Essentially most Irish villages, no matter how remote, would participate in this grand steam-vehicle network. Locals would be able to earn extra money by carrying rocks to the fuel stations, rocks that would be used to build, repair, or maintain the roadways. In addition, every village would require a local road repair crew.
Although engineers developed ingenious steam-powered road vehicles, they did not enjoy the same level of acceptance and expansion as steam power at sea and on the railways in the middle and late 19th century of the "age of steam".
Ransomes built a portable steam engine, that is a farm steam engine on wheels, hauled from farm to farm by horses in 1841. The next year Ransomes automated it and had the engine drive itself to farms.
Harsh legislation virtually eliminated mechanically propelled vehicles from the roads of Great Britain for 30years, the Locomotive Act 1861 imposing restrictive speed limits on "road locomotives" of 5mph (8.0km/h) in towns and cities, and 10mph (16km/h) in the country. The Locomotives Act 1865 (the famous Red Flag Act) further reduced the speed limits to 4mph (6.4km/h) in the country and just 2mph (3.2km/h) in towns and cities, additionally requiring a man bearing a red flag (red lantern during the hours of darkness) to precede every vehicle. At the same time, the act gave local authorities the power to specify the hours during which any such vehicle might use the roads. The sole exceptions were street trams which from 1879 onwards were authorised under licence from the Board of Trade.
In France the situation was radically different from the extent of the 1861ministerial ruling formally authorising the circulation of steam vehicles on ordinary roads. Whilst this led to considerable technological advances throughout the 1870s and 1880s, steam vehicles nevertheless remained a rarity.
To an extent competition from the successful railway network reduced the need for steam vehicles. From the 1860s onwards, attention was turned more to the development of various forms of traction engine which could either be used for stationary work such as sawing wood and threshing, or for transporting outsize loads too voluminous to go by rail. Steam trucks were also developed but their use was generally confined to the local distribution of heavy materials such as coal and building materials from railway stations and ports.
Rickett of Buckingham steam car
In 1854 Thomas Rickett of Buckingham built the first of several steam cars and in 1858 he built the second. Instead of looking like a steam car it resembled a small locomotive. It consisted of a steam engine mounted on three wheels: two large driven rear wheels and one smaller front wheel by which the vehicle was steered. The weight of the machine was 1.5 tonnes and somewhat lighter than Rickett's steam car. The whole was driven by a chain drive and a maximum speed of twelve miles per hour was reached.
Two years later in 1860 Rickett built a similar but heavier vehicle. This model incorporated spur-gear drive instead of chain. In his final design resembling a railway locomotive, the cylinders were coupled directly outside the cranks of the driving-axle.
In 1864 Italian inventor Innocenzo Manzetti built a road steamer.[29] It had the boiler at the front and a single cylinder engine.
Holt Road steamer
H.P. Holt constructed a small road steamer in 1866. Able to reach a speed of twenty miles per hour on level roads, it had a vertical boiler at the rear and two separate twin cylinder engines, each of which drove one rear wheel by means of a chain and sprocket wheels.
Taylor Steam buggy
Taylor's Steam buggy of 1867
In 1867 Canadian jeweller Henry Seth Taylor demonstrated his four wheeled steam buggy at the Stanstead Fair in Stanstead, Quebec and again the following year.[30] The basis of the buggy which he began building in 1865 was a high wheeled carriage with bracing to support a two-cylinder steam engine mounted on the floor.[31]
In 1869 a small three wheeled vehicle propelled by a horizontal twin cylinder engine which drove the rear axle by spur gearing, only one rear wheel was driven, the other turning freely on the axle. A vertical fire-tube boiler was mounted at the rear with a polished copper casing over the fire box and chimney, the boiler was enclosed in a mahogany casing. The weight was only 19 cwt and the front wheel was used for steering.
Thomson of Edinburgh Road steamer
Thomson's Road steamer with charcoal wagons (engraving of 1870)Robey's Road steamer built to Thomson's design
In 1869 the road steamer built by Robert William Thomson of Edinburgh became famous because its wheels were shod with heavy solid rubber tyres. Thomson's first road steamers, manufactured in his own small workshop in Leith, were fitted with three wheels, the small single wheel at the front being directly below the steering wheel. The tyres, which were 125mm (4.92in) thick, were corrugated internally and adhered to the wheel by friction. He then turned to T. M. Tennant and Co of Bowershall Iron and Engine Works, Leith for their manufacture, but as they could not keep up with demand in 1870 some of the production was moved to Robey & Co of Lincoln.[34] Over the next two years Robeys built 32 of these vehicles, which were either 8 or 12 horsepower (6.0 or 8.9kW) versions. A large proportion were exported. These included one to Italy (for an experiment of public transport in Bergamo), three to Austria (Vienna) and others to Turkey, Australia, New Zealand, India, Ireland, Chile, Russia (Moscow) and Greece. A further Thomson steam vehicle was built in 1877, but apart from traction engines, Robeys appear to have discontinued making road steam vehicles until 1904, when they started manufacturing steam road lorries.[35]
In 1871 Julius Kemna, a German industrialist, started selling English steam threshing systems. A couple of years later Kemna started producing various other steam-powered vehicles (such as road rollers) but also high quality steam ploughing engines and road steamers.
Randolph of Glasgow Steam bus
In 1872 a steam coach by Charles Randolph of Glasgow weighed four and a half long tons (5.0 short tons; 4.6t), was 15 feet (4.57m) in length, but had a maximum speed of only six miles per hour (9.7km/h). Two vertical twin cylinder engines were independent of one another and each drove one of the rear wheels by spur gearing. The entire vehicle was enclosed and fitted with windows all around, carried six people, and even had two driving mirrors for observing traffic approaching from behind, the earliest recorded instance of such a device.
Bollée Steam bus
Bollée's L'Obéissante steam bus photographed in 1875
From 1873 to 1883 Amédée Bollée of Le Mans built a series of steam-powered passenger vehicles able to carry 6 to 12people at speeds up to 60km/h (37mph), with such names as La Rapide, La Nouvelle, La Marie-Anne, La Mancelle and L'Obéissante. To L'Obeissante the boiler was mounted behind the passenger compartment with the engine at the front of the vehicle, driving the differential through a shaft with chain drive to the rear wheels. The driver sat behind the engine and steered by means of a wheel mounted on a vertical shaft. The lay out more closely resembled much later motor cars than other steam vehicles. Moreover, in 1873 it had independent suspension on all four corners.[36][37]
In 1892 painter Joens Cederholm and his brother, André, a blacksmith, designed their first car, a two-seater, introducing a condensor in 1894. It was not a success.[38]
Shearer of South Australia steam car
Shearer's steam car in 1898
Starting in 1894 David Shearer designed and built the first car in Australia. It was capable of 15 miles per hour (24km/h) on the streets of Adelaide, South Australia. The boiler was his own design, being a horizontal boiler of the semi flash type. Steering was by a tiller type design and a photograph of the vehicle shows it carrying eight passengers. The news article on the car has a sectional drawing of the design.[39][40] The car's first official road trial was in 1899.[41]
The development by Léon Serpollet of the flash steam boiler[42] brought about the appearance of various diminutive steam tricycles and quadricycles during the late 80s and early 90s, notably by de Dion and Bouton, these successfully competed in long-distance races but soon met with stiff competition for public favour from the internal combustion engine cars being developed, notably by Peugeot, that quickly cornered most of the popular market. In the face of the flood of IC cars, proponents of the steam car had to fight a long rear guard battle that was to last into modern times.
Locomobile Company of America
Locomobile steam car from a January 1901 advertisement
This American firm bought the patents from the Stanley brothers and began building their steam buggies from 1898 to 1905. Locomobile Company of America went into building gas cars and lasted until the Depression.
Stanley Motor Carriage Company
In 1902 the twins Francis E. Stanley (1849–1918) and Freelan O. Stanley formed the Stanley Motor Carriage Company. They made famous models such as the 1906 Stanley Rocket, 1908 Stanley K Raceabout and 1923 Stanley Steam Car.[43]
Early to mid-20th century
For a more detailed history of 20th century steam cars, see steam car.
In 1906 the land speed record was broken by a Stanley steam car, piloted by Fred Marriott, which achieved 127mph (204km/h) at Ormond Beach, Florida. This annual week-long "Speed Week" was the forerunner of today's Daytona 500. This record was not exceeded by any land vehicle until 1910, and stood as the steam-powered world speed record till 25 August 2009.
Attempts were made to bring more advanced steam cars on the market, the most remarkable being the Doble Steam Car which shortened start up time very noticeably by incorporating a highly efficient mono tube steam generator to heat a much smaller quantity of water along with effective automation of burner and water feed control. By 1923 Doble's steam cars could be started from cold with the turn of a key and driven off in 40seconds or less.[44]
Paxton Phoenix steam car
1953 Paxton Phoenix steam car
Abner Doble developed the Doble Ultimax engine for the Paxton Phoenix steam car, built by the Paxton Engineering Division of McCulloch Motors Corporation, Los Angeles. Its sustained maximum power was 120bhp (89kW). The project was eventually dropped in 1954.[45]
Decline of steam car development
Steam cars became less popular after the adoption of the electric starter, which eliminated the need for risky hand cranking to start gasoline-powered cars. The introduction of assembly-line mass production by Henry Ford, which hugely reduced the cost of owning a conventional automobile, was also a strong factor in the steam car's demise as the Model T was both cheap and reliable.
In 1968 renewed interest was shown, sometimes prompted by newly available techniques. Some of these designs used safer and more responsive water-tube boilers.[46] A prototype car was built by Charles J. & Calvin E. Williams of Ambler, Pennsylvania. Other high-performance steam cars were built by Richard J. Smith of Midway City, California, and A.M. and E. Pritchard of Caulfeld, Australia. Companies/organisations as Controlled Steam Dynamics of Mesa, Arizona, General Motors, Thermo-Electron Corp. of Waltham, Massachusetts, and Kinetics Inc., of Sarasota, Florida all built high-performance steam engines in the same period. Bill Lear also started work on a closed circuit steam turbine to power cars and buses, and built a transit bus and converted a Chevrolet Monte Carlo sedan to use this turbine system. It used a proprietary working fluid dubbed Learium, possibly a chlorofluorocarbon similar to DuPont Freon.[47][dubious–discuss]
In 1970 a variant of the steam car was made by Wallace L. Minto, which works on Ucon U-113 fluorocarbon as the working fluid instead of water. The car was called the Minto car.[46][48]
Land speed record
On 25 August 2009 a team of British engineers from Hampshire ran their steam-powered car "Inspiration" at Edwards Air Force Base in the Mojave Desert, and averaged 139.84mph (225.05km/h) over two runs, driven by Charles Burnett III. The car was 7.62m (25ft 0in) long and weighed 3,000kg (6,614lb), built from carbon fibre and aluminium and contained 12 boilers with over 2 miles (3.2km) of steamtubing.[49]
The Stanley Motor Carriage Company was an American manufacturer of steam cars that operated from 1902 to 1924, going defunct after it failed to adapt to competition from rapidly improving Internal combustion engine vehicles. The cars made by the company were colloquially called Stanley Steamers although several different models were produced.
De Dion-Bouton was a French automobile manufacturer and railcar manufacturer, which operated from 1883 to 1953. The company was founded by the Marquis Jules-Albert de Dion, Georges Bouton, and Bouton's brother-in-law Charles Trépardoux.
A steam car is a car (automobile) propelled by a steam engine. A steam engine is an external combustion engine (ECE), whereas the gasoline and diesel engines that eventually became standard are internal combustion engines (ICE). ECEs have a lower thermal efficiency, but carbon monoxide production is more readily regulated.
A three-wheeler is a vehicle with three wheels. Some are motorized tricycles, which may be legally classed as motorcycles, while others are tricycles without a motor, some of which are human-powered vehicles and animal-powered vehicles.
Crude ideas and designs of automobiles can be traced back to ancient and medieval times. In 1649, Hans Hautsch of Nuremberg built a clockwork-driven carriage. In 1672, a small-scale steam-powered vehicle was created; the first steam-powered automobile capable of human transportation was built by Nicolas-Joseph Cugnot in 1769. Inventors began to branch out at the start of the 19th century, creating the de Rivaz engine, one of the first internal combustion engines, and an early electric motor. Samuel Brown later tested the first industrially applied internal combustion engine in 1826. Only two of these were made.
A motorized bicycle is a bicycle with an attached motor or engine and transmission used either to power the vehicle unassisted, or to assist with pedalling. Since it sometimes retains both pedals and a discrete connected drive for rider-powered propulsion, the motorized bicycle is in technical terms a true bicycle, albeit a power-assisted one. Typically they are incapable of speeds above 52 km/h (32 mph), however in recent years larger motors have been built, allowing bikes to reach speeds of upwards of 72 km/h.
A steam tricycle is a steam-driven three-wheeled vehicle.
Thomas Rickett from Buckingham, England, made a steam-powered car in 1860. Several examples were made and it was also advertised.
The Benz Patent-Motorwagen, built in 1885 by the German Karl Benz, is widely regarded as the first practical modern automobile and was the first car put into production. It was patented in January 1886 and unveiled in public later that year. The original cost of the vehicle was 600 imperial German marks, approximately 150 US dollars.
Walter Hancock was an English inventor of the Victorian period. He is chiefly remembered for his steam-powered road vehicles, but also received a patent for preparing and cutting natural rubber into sheets. He was the younger brother of Thomas Hancock, the inventor of rubber mastication who is also claimed by some to be the inventor of rubber vulcanization.
The history of the motorcycle begins in the second half of the 19th century. Motorcycles are descended from the "safety bicycle," a bicycle with front and rear wheels of the same size and a pedal crank mechanism to drive the rear wheel. Despite some early landmarks in its development, the motorcycle lacks a rigid pedigree that can be traced back to a single idea or machine. Instead, the idea seems to have occurred to numerous engineers and inventors around Europe at around the same time.
Amédée-Ernest Bollée was a French bellfounder and inventor who specialized in steam cars. After 1867 he was known as "Amédée père" to distinguish him from his similarly named son, Amédée-Ernest-Marie Bollée (1867–1926).
Straker-Squire was a British automobile manufacturer based in Bristol, and later Edmonton in North London.
The London Steam Carriage was an early steam-powered road vehicle constructed by Richard Trevithick in 1803 and the world's first self-propelled passenger-carrying vehicle. Cugnot had built a steam vehicle 30 years previously, but that had been a slow-moving artillery tractor, not built to carry passengers.
The Michaux-Perreaux steam velocipede was a steam powered velocipede made in France some time from 1867 to 1871, when a small Louis-Guillaume Perreaux commercial steam engine was attached to a Pierre Michaux manufactured iron framed pedal bicycle. It is one of three motorcycles claimed to be the first motorcycle, along with the Roper steam velocipede of 1867 or 1868, and the internal combustion engine Daimler Reitwagen of 1885. Perreaux continued development of his steam cycle, and exhibited a tricycle version by 1884. The only Michaux-Perreaux steam velocipede made, on loan from the Musée de l'Île-de-France, Sceaux, was the first machine viewers saw upon entering the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum rotunda in The Art of the Motorcycle exhibition in New York in 1998.
The Roper steam velocipede was a steam-powered velocipede built by inventor Sylvester H. Roper of Roxbury, Boston, Massachusetts, United States sometime from 1867 to 1869. It is one of three machines which have been called the first motorcycle, along with the Michaux-Perreaux steam velocipede, also dated 1867–1869, and the 1885 Daimler Reitwagen. Historians disagree over whether the Roper or the Michaux-Perreaux came first. Though the Reitwagen came many years later than the two steam cycles, it is often labeled as the "first motorcycle" because there is doubt by some experts whether a steam cycle should meet the definition of a motorcycle.
Sylvester Howard Roper was an American inventor and a pioneering builder of early automobiles and motorcycles from Boston, Massachusetts. In 1863 he built a steam carriage, one of the earliest automobiles. The Roper steam velocipede of 1867–1869 may have been the first motorcycle, for which he was inducted into the Motorcycle Hall of Fame in 2002. He is also the inventor of the shotgun choke and a revolver repeating shotgun.
The Daimler Reitwagen or Einspur was a motor vehicle made by Gottlieb Daimler and Wilhelm Maybach in 1885. It is widely recognized as the first motorcycle. Daimler is often called "the father of the motorcycle" for this invention. Even when the steam powered two-wheelers that preceded the Reitwagen, the Michaux-Perreaux and Roper of 1867–1869, and the 1884 Copeland, are considered motorcycles, it remains nonetheless the first gasoline internal combustion motorcycle, and the forerunner of all vehicles, land, sea and air, that use its overwhelmingly popular engine type.
The Grenville steam carriage was developed in 1875 by Robert Neville-Grenville, assisted by George Jackson Churchward. It was built around a boiler from a Merryweather & Sons fire engine, and could carry seven people including the driver, steersman and stoker.
↑ "Caption", Lowell Daily Citizen and News, no.2050, Lowell, Massachusetts, 6 January 1863, S. H. Roper, of Roxbury, has invented a steam wagon for common roads, which stops, turns corners, backs, 'keeps to the right as the law directs,' and does many other intelligent things under the hands of a skillful driver.
↑ "Miscellaneous items, Mr Sylvester H Roper of Roxbury, Mass has invented a steam carriage…", New Haven Daily Palladium, no.52, New Haven, Connecticut, 3 March 1863
1 2 3 Falco, Charles M.; Guggenheim Museum Staff (1998), "Issues in the Evolution of the Motorcycle", in Krens, Thomas; Drutt, Matthew (eds.), The Art of the Motorcycle, Harry N. Abrams, pp.24–31, 98–101, ISBN0-89207-207-5 Michaux-Perreaux year 1868. Roper year 1869.{{citation}}: CS1 maint: postscript (link)
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