Motorcycles first entered the transportation scene as terrifying, steam-powered wooden bicycles, completely lacking the gasoline combustion engines that give modern choppers their signature, neighborhood-waking roar.

A closer look

Motorcycles first entered the transportation scene as terrifying, steam-powered wooden bicycles, completely lacking the gasoline combustion engines that give modern choppers their signature, neighborhood-waking roar. The very first iteration, built by Sylvester Roper in the late 1860s, featured a miniature coal-fired steam boiler strapped precariously between the rider's legs, which seems like a brilliant way to accidentally boil your own thighs. Roper would cruise around local fairs and race tracks, terrifying the horses and covering the audience in thick black smoke, completely oblivious to the explosive hazard sitting directly underneath his crotch. In a truly poetic yet entirely tragic end, Roper actually died of an abrupt heart attack while speeding on one of his upgraded steam-cycles during a public demonstration. He basically went out doing exactly what he loved, which was straddling a tiny, highly unstable pressure cooker while going aggressively fast