A BRIEF HISTORY OF TIME
One of these days I shall have to list all the motorcycle companies which started out as bicycle manufacturers. This was in the early days, you understand, and here I am talking late 19th and early 20th century, the time when transport really took off in a big way. Anyway, Ariel is one of those companies, and in 1870, James Starley and William Hillman called themselves Ariel – ‘The Spirit of the Air’ – and started to make wired – not weird, but wired – spoked wheels and penny farthing bicycles.
This may not seem very innovative today, but back then some bicycles still had wooden spokes – haven’t we come a long way? I continue. Over thirty years later they had the technology to make their first motorcycle, complete with both a magneto and a carburettor. That same year in 1902, Charles Sangster’s Components Ltd bought the company,
