A Brief History of
Indian
Motocycles
Will Boutelle,
M.D.
Springfield
Museums
May 8, 2008

References
! A Century of Indian. Youngblood, Ed (2001).
! Indian Motorcycle Photo History. Hatfield,
Jerry (1993).
! Golden Age of the Fours. Hodgdon, Ted
(1974).
! Classic Indian Motorcycle Carroll, John
(no date)
! Hendersons, Those Elegant Machines.
Schultz, Richard (1994).

Springfield, Massachusetts
! Manufacturing hub from mid-
19th century
! Large pool of skilled labor,
plentiful power, and available
capital
! At least three cars (Duryea,
Knox and Rolls Royce), bicycles
and motorcycles

1893 Duryea, Springfield Mass.

DURYEA
1893 - Brothers Charles & Frank built first car
1895 - Second car, won 1st auto race in USA
(50 miles roundtrip Chicago-Evanston)
1896 - First production run (13 units)
- First auto accident (NYC, Henry Wells
hit bicyclist in his Duryea, went to jail
overnight)
Manufactured at least until
1913 in IL, NJ, and PA

Late-Model Duryea

Knox Automobile 1900-1914

KNOX AUTOMOBILE
Built:
! Cars
! Trucks
! Tractors
! Fire engines
\" Using Knox engines, Springfield
became first mechanized fire dept. in
the United States

Springfield Rolls Royce

George Hendee, 1884

Oscar Hedstrom Pacer, 1899

INDIAN PRODUCTION FIGURES
1901 3
1902 143
1903 376
1904 ?
1905 1000+
1908 3000+
1910 6000+
1913 32000+
1914 25000
1915 21000

Indian #268 (early 1903).
With engine and gas tank, it’s a bicycle!

From 1906 Indian catalogue, showing various
products: Tandem, triplet, tri-car, tricycle and van

1907: First cataloged twin cylinder Indian.
42 degree angle between front and rear
cylinder. All Indian twins through the end
retained this angle

1909 Loop Frame
- No longer a bicycle with a motor

Steering head of 1909 Indian single.
Note U-joint controls for gas and spark.

• Indian always concentrated on police business.
Pictured below is a 1910 two-man patrol V-twin
in Cincinnati.
• NYPD placed their first order in 1903.

Indian Factories

1911 Isle of Man
TT Race (Britain)
! Indian came in
1st, 2nd, and 3rd
place

Board track racing
Los Angeles 1912
1/3 mile tack, 90 mph

Eddie Hasha with “big base” 8-valve twin, Sept.
1912, on steeply banked board track.
Photo taken just before an accident killed him,
another racer and six spectators in Newark, NJ
This was the only
time that
Motorcycle racing
ever made the front
page of the NY
Times

1912 Indian with “Colonial sidecar”
made of wicker

1914 Indian with Indian sidecar

1913 Indian twin with spring frame
Major Innovation, but nobody else followed
Note early “buddy seat” hanging off the back

Ford Model T:
• Hauled five people
• Kept you dry with top up
• Got cheaper to buy every year
• Killed market for motorcycle as cheap transportation

Oscar Hedstrom, Indian’s engineering father,
retires at age 42 in 1913

Oscar Hedstrom, circa 1913

Hendee Special
• Electric Starting, but no generator

Pancho Villa
• It’s hard to
understand why he
needed electric
starting, with no
place to charge his
batteries for miles
around.
• Two years later,
he was being
chased by General
John J. Pershing

George Hendee Leaves Indian in 1915.
Now both the founders are gone.

Gun Car, 1915
marketed to British army

1919 spring-frame military Indian.
Note gas lamp and brass levers.

1917 Model O
• First Indian Attempt at a lightweight twin
Cylinders opposed, front and aft
• Harley riders called it the “Model Zero”
due to its low power

Erwin “Cannonball” Baker
• Not too bright, but he could stay awake for days
May 1914: San Diego/New York
11 days, 12 hrs, 10 min
August 1915: Canada/Mexico
3 days, 9 hrs, 15 min
1917: 24-hr. record:1534.25 miles
All on Indians

Publicity photo of Baker on Indian

Great Motorcycles,
bad business

Scout, 1921
Starting to look like modern motorcycle

Scout primary drive -- helical gears in oil bath.
Led to the chant,“You can’t
wear out an Indian Scout”

1923 Chief
• First 74 cubic inch motor

1922 Chief with sidecar

Orie Steele
• Pre-eminent hill climber with trophies, on 1924
Scout

1925 Indian Prince
• 2nd attempt at lightweight motorcycle

1926 souped up overhead valve Prince
(Still didn’t sell)

Typical small-town Indian agency of 1920’s
• Dealer and wife in front of showroom

Lineage of the future Indian Four Motocycle
Will Henderson, designer of:
• Henderson, 1912-1917
• Ace 1922-1926
• Indian bought out Ace after
bankruptcy

1912 Henderson
• First year of manufacturing
• First motorcycle to drive around the world
(driven by C.S. Clancy)

Mr. & Mrs. Will Henderson on 1912 Henderson

1917 Henderson
• Company sold to Schwinn Dec, 1917
• Will and Tom Henderson kept on as
consultants, but Will soon left to start Ace
Motorcycle Company

Ace Designed by W. Henderson
Sept. 1922: Cannonball
Baker rode Ace LA-NY (3332
miles) in 6 days, 22 hours
and 52 minutes
“World’s Fastest Motorcycle”
129 mph solo, 106 mph
with sidecar
Will Henderson Killed Dec.
1922, while testing the new
Ace on city streets

1927 Indian Ace

Indian Car

Silver
Arrow
Outboard
Motor

Non-motorcycle products fail

1930-1939
Du Pont to the Rescue

Du Pont Letter, 1930

1930 Hillclimber

1932 Scout Pony

1936 Chief (restored 2005)

1936 Chief
view from
saddle

1938 Four Cylinder
• restored 1999

1938 Four Cylinder

1939 Traffic car

1941 Military Model 841

Sport Scout, 1941

1941 Chief

1941 Four Cylinder

1947 Chief and Sidecar
! Owned by Jim
Seidell
! 3 miles from
Chesterfield
Center
! Jim owns
several other
Indians

1947 Chief and wife
• chief restored 1998
• wife in original unrestored condition)

Indian’s
Last
Mistake

1949 Scout

1949 Scout engine
• Poorly engineered
• Poorly tested
• Bad electrics
• Not a V-twin
• Dealers can’t sell them
• Dealers give up and
turn to Harley

When engineering fails, turn to PR
• Erwin “Cannonball”
Baker (who won his
first race in 1909),
pulled out of
retirement to tout the
vertical twin Indian.
1948
• We don’t know who
the “Motorcycle
Queen” was

When engineering fails, turn to PR (Part 2)
! Jane Russell
presented with her
own Indian Vertical
Twin, 1948
! No one knows
whether she ever
rode it

When engineering fails, turn to PR (Part 3)
! Vaughn Monroe
(who actually
rode motorcycles)
brought in for
photo on Indian
! Not recorded as
to how many
Indians he was
given

1950 Chief
• Same stroke, but bored
out to 80 cubic inches
• Plunger fork 1950-’53
• Except for fork, bored
cylinder and minor engine
& body changes, basically
the same as 1948 Chief
• The dealers had all gone
over to Harley

Indian Factory 1952-53
! Assembling the last Indians
! Indian name about to be sold to distributors of English
motorcycles
! Dealers not told of production termination

1947 and 1905 Indians
Not the first and not the last,
but quite a transition over 42 years

Last of the Breed
! Indian Factory
1953
! Last non-police
bikes built
! The very last of
1953 production
went to the
NYPD who had
placed their first
order for
Indians in 1903

1953

Indian Factory (1981)
! Indian long gone
! Crime-ridden
neighborhood
! George Hendee’s
office windows in
large arch on
corner

Interior of Indian Factory, 1981
Building is now used as an apartment building

Indian Factory, 1984
! Large parts of the original factory were demolished
! What remains has been renovated for housing

Now What ???

European Indian Rally
Scotland, 1994

Indian Racing Team
Daytona Beach, Florida

Esta Manthos Collection of Antique Motorcycles
given to Springfield Museums in June 2007

Last “Indian Day” July 2005
Esta Manthos presenting Oscar Hedstrom
“Best of Show” trophy to Will Boutelle, MD
for 1938 Indian Four Cylinder

Proposed Museum of Springfield History

Questions