In 1885 Gottlieb Daimler patented the first motor-driven, two-wheeled vehicle and is generally considered to be the first true motorcycle. Daimler's claim of developing the first "true" motorcycle is the fact that it was gasoline-driven.
I we really want to get into the crooks of it the first motorcycle ever built was in fact by Sylvester Roper, Roper built a steam-powered motorcycle in 1867. Roper, who spent the U.S. Civil War working in a Union armory, built a primitive "motorcycle" as early as 1867. Roper's supporters – and he has more than a few – argue that he should be credited with building the world's first motorcycle.
Roper's motorcycle was remarkable by any standard. It looked a lot like the new motorcycles, but with a small vertical steam boiler under the seat, which also held a small water tank. The boiler supplied two small pistons that powered a crank drive on the back wheel. Very neat and compact, and there was more: Roper controlled the steam throttle by twisting the bike's straight handlebar. Twist-grip control was later reinvented by the early pilot Glen Curtiss. It was invented, yet again, at the Indian Motorcycle Company.
