You return from France in the Spring of 1919. A year was spent in the Army on a foreign continent, eating every tinned meal from an aluminum tray and being trapped in the monotony of mundane military tasks. You’ve become restless. Even after the shells stopped raining down, a flu pandemic carried on killing those who were close enough to have breathed on each other. It kills by the score and it doesn’t seem to care who is unlucky enough, only that they’re young and full of promise. There was something in the eyes of those left living; the Americans, British, French, and even the Germans and Austrians; removedness. Your same restlessness.

However, in the final months of the war when the attrition of trench warfare was broken, you observed something else; mechanization on a grand scale. Tanks, airplanes, and artillery tractors. Model T ambulances brought your wounded comrades from the front and even the enemy prisoners remarked meekly what a fine vehicle it was. You would know because you passed many ambulances in your service as a motorcycle dispatch rider. The dispatch case with battlefield orders that you carried bound you to Army life, but the motorcycle would set you free.

Stateside, the bike industry is booming. A few weeks in the backcountry with a motorcycle and a surplus “pup” tent will do you well with unwinding and forgetting the quagmire that consumed an entire generation. You — along with the entire American public — are entering a golden age of “motor camping.” Speed and efficiency have joint kingship, and the national interest will soon shape the cross-continent road system. Motorcycles, with their adventurous appeal and adaptability, are at the forefront of affordable transportation.

Counter Culture

Think of the word “motorcyclist” today and you’re likely to conjure images of bikers in your mind. Rough-cut, brawny, fringed leather chaps, white tees, questionable tattoos, and perhaps handlebar mustaches or goatees.  The famous clubs —with painted “leathers” that strike fear into rivals and display accolades earned in highway warfare — have their place in American lore like the outlaw gangs of the Wild West.

Their image has created a lifestyle brand that encompasses many layers of society; from asphalt cowboys who rip the throttle of a $30k bike at crowded red lights to guys more comfortable brawling in a casino than feeding pennies into a slot machine. How did this violent change, so widely seen, occur after World War II?

Narcotics.

The Counter Culture opened the floodgates to illicit narcotics and some clubs were opportunistic. Despite the wide appeal of motorcycling, the subculture worked itself into a dark corner that has sent the industry’s old hands reeling and opened many file drawers at the FBI. Clubs that have never touched the stuff can sometimes give off a “gangland” aesthetic.

Even with the best engineers and designers for a brand, the customer’s choice of wheels is a stylistic one at the end of the day. For better or worse in the Western world, what you wear reflects what you drive. The declining sales of traditional brands are (perhaps unfairly) the result of image, and an inability to steer it back in a popular direction.

Just as workwear enthusiasts turn their attention from the postwar era to earlier in the century, aesthetics can be gleaned from when motorcycling was at the forefront of innovative travel.

The New Century

Motorcycle culture prior to World War II was markedly different than the 1960s-to-present era. As the year 1900 loomed, automobiles were seen as playthings for the urban rich. Between cities, roads were an unpaved joke where the punchline was delivered each muddy Spring. Another two-wheeled invention began to take hold and, coincidentally, it was the bicycling clubs that initially led the charge to improve overland travel. Without question, preexisting bicycle design and manufacturing played a key role in creating their mechanical counterparts.

Moving between points on a map without the need for a horse was revolutionary, especially in the context of everyday people going about their business. Large cities already faced livability issues with throngs of animals traversing the streets daily. Machinists and salesmen soon seized the reigns.

The concept of a powered, horseless two-wheel vehicle had already been prototyped in the mid-19th century. Like with the automobile, mass production is what gave resilience and accessibility to the idea.  Europe made early strides with production motorbikes including the first mass-produced brand, from Germany, Hildebrand & Wolfmüller (1894). That same year also saw the first instance of the English word “motor cycle.” Great Britain followed with their own line of motorcycles from Excelsior Motor Company (1896), while the United States threw its hat in the ring two years later with Orient-Aster.

The titans of the industry–who would become household names the world over–emerged shortly after motorists got a thirst for speed. Hendee Manufacturing Company began producing Indian motorcycles out of Massachusetts in 1901, or about four years after they were established to make bicycles. The early success of the motorbike meant that the Indian Motorcycle Company would be formed in 1923, changing the name of George Hendee’s original enterprise.

As Hendee rolled out its first motorcycle, the perennial Harley-Davidson took its first steps in a Wisconsin shade-tree machine shop. William Harley and Arthur Davidson, both in their early twenties at the time, leveraged their contacts to piece together a prototype and establish their enterprise in 1903. The Great War (alternatively dubbed World War I, 1914-1918) was a gamble that Indian ultimately took a loss on–their government production contract, while bigger than Harley-Davidson’s, stretched their commercial supply chain to the breaking point. However, over the following decade, motorcycle makers across the country enjoyed an age of automotive bonanza.

Fast forward to after The Great Depression (1929 to 1939); Harley-Davidson and Indian are the only American motorcycle corporations to survive. By comparison, Britain had over 80 competing manufacturers in the same period. The two American juggernauts battled like Coke and Pepsi until Indian folded in 1953. Various companies have since attempted to revive the brand.

Dressing for Speed

The pioneers of early motoring shared stylistic similarities with their aviation counterparts. This comparison is especially fitting; both groups were held in high esteem for pushing the technological bounds of human travel. Once indicative of both pilots and motorcyclists, leather skull caps and goggles have since fallen out of favor with the adoption of closed cockpits (on airplanes) and crash helmets with integral lenses (on bikes).

A 1916 article in the journal Flight summarized,

“Although it has been demonstrated on several occasions that the wearing of a safety helmet has saved the wearer from serious injury, there are still many who prefer to keep their heads more or less unencumbered. In this case the tight-fitting leather “skull-cap” [sic.] as used by motorists is very popular, and is certainly better than the ordinary cloth cap…With the cap is a leather mask having a special form of goggles giving a wide field of vision.”

As for the iconic look of tinted sunglasses? In 1928, Harley-Davidson began selling them in their catalogs as “Outinglas.”

Wool to Keep You Warm

In the 1910s and ’20s, mackinaws, Norfolk jackets, and other belted, felted, and knit variations, were popular among many from sportsmen to gearheads. Having the freedom of movement that a shorter coat provides is important for active wear. Shawl collars became all the rage during this period as well. The Patrick Duluth Woolen Mills were to thank for that–they reimagined the mackinaw for a new crowd in 1912. Appealing to young adults proved to be a solid marketing strategy as the “Nansen” (shawl) collar spread to other designers.

Motorcycle Fashion Goes to War

During The Great War, motorcycles became invaluable for reconnaissance, evacuating casualties, delivering dispatches, and a variety of other roles. The potential of motorized transport became fully realized in the wake of carnage and destruction. While outdated in its battlefield tactics until the final months of the war, the U.S. Army was keener on contemporary fashion having adopted its own version of the mackinaw in 1907. By 1917, the military’s specifications stated that,

“Mackinaw coats or a similar garment, will be issued to drivers of motor trucks, motor cars, motor ambulances, and motorcycles, in lieu of the olive drab overcoat.“

America had spooled up production for a long war. A year and a half after its entry, the end was drawing near and warehouses full of military uniforms and equipment sat untapped. The surplus market was about to boom. Catalogs filled with everything from coats to tents to utensils appeased the public’s appetite for inexpensive military goods. A muted rainbow of olive-khaki-brown was in vogue.

Leather is King

Let’s take a step back for a second. Even without all of the nuances of motorcycle subculture, riding a two-wheeled vehicle at highway speeds is not for the faint of heart. Around 5,000 motorcyclists die on modern American roads each year!

Humans, in their never-ending desire to seek thrills with machinery, need to survive the experience and clothing plays a very important role in this regard. Leather is a reliable choice for breeches (jodhpurs), gloves, puttees (leggings), and jackets. Kidney belts provide extra body support for rough roads. Besides guarding against bracing winds, back strain, and potential “road rash,” leatherwear also wards off the grease, grime, and heat generated so close to the rider’s limbs.

From starting the bike to balancing, emphasis is put on the motorcyclist’s lower body. Puttees, the premium ones being leather, are secured around your lower leg and extend above shorter boots to cover calves and shins. As far as footwear goes? Lace-up tall boots could be worn in lieu of puttees and there was a booming market for tall boots during the nineteen-tens and ‘twenties as well. In short, motorcycling fashion and safety depend on good “leathers.”

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Part 2 coming on 05.01.2023

Lead image Caption and Credits: A motorcycle relay team prepares to ride from Washington D.C. to San Francisco in this 1915 photo. Gauntlet gloves, knit cardigans, and jodhpurs pair well with vintage bikes. Image via Shorpy.com.