The Copeland brothers are to be credited with the first attempt to produce the motorcycle upon a commercial basis, but their efforts were unsuccessful. Their invention seemed to be far ahead of the times, and their project passed by unappreciated. In 1886, S. H. Roper, of Roxbury, Mass., appeared with a steam-propelled bicycle which consisted of a specially designed engine placed in a bicycle frame of the type with which we are familiar today. This invention was awkward, and its weight of 150 pounds made it difficult to handle, but in spite of that its inventor is said to have obtained considerable use from it. [Illustration: THE PENNINGTON MOTORCYCLE, 1895] The year 1895 saw the first public exhibition of mechanically operated two-wheel vehicles held at Madison Square Garden, New York City. The sensation of the show was a motorcycle which was presented by E. J. Pennington of Cleveland. This was the first public appearance of a cycle propelled by a combustion engine, and in that regard it may be called the first appearance of the motorcycle in the form that it is known today. The Pennington machine was the first-known vehicle to attempt the use of gasoline. History fails to relate a great deal about the mechanical detail of the Pennington model, but it is said to have made a very creditable performance in exhibition. It appeared at the Madison Square Garden in two forms, as a single motorcycle and as a motor tandem. [Illustration: HEDSTROM MOTOR TANDEM, 1898] There was little or no interest in motor vehicles of any description in that period of the early nineties, consequently the Pennington efforts were fruitless. Shortly after the public exhibition of his models, financial difficulties are said to have overtaken Pennington and he is reported to have departed suddenly for foreign climes, bringing his experiments to an abrupt end. [Illustration: A BIG TWIN MODEL] [Illustration: AN UP-TO-DATE “FEATHERWEIGHT” MODEL] Along in the late nineties a keen interest in bicycle racing led to the introduction of what is known as the motor-paced tandem. This consisted of a regulation tandem bicycle on which was mounted a gasoline motor geared up to the rear wheel with a chain drive. The tandem rider on the forward seat did the steering and the foot pedaling, and the rear rider operated the motor. It is believed that the first of these tandems came over here from France. By 1898 the popularity of the motor-paced racing bicycle became so great that attention was soon directed toward their manufacture. Chief among the bicycle manufacturers who took up the making of the motor-paced tandem was Oscar Hedstrom, a racer with many notable victories to his credit. He believed that he could make a motor tandem which would prove far superior to any other American machine made, if not better even than any foreign machine. [Illustration: CRADLE SPRING FRAME CONSTRUCTION]