Indian SPRING

Once the dust had settled after the Great War, it became clear that America's thriving motorcycle industry would struggle to survive in the 1920s. The initial abundance of multiple pioneer marques contracted massively. The pattern followed the same path as the British industry, where dozens of one-man workshops collapsed or consolidated into major concerns. But America always does things big - including industrial decline. At its pre-war peak, the USA could count nearly a hundred motorcycle marques but after WW1 there were only three left standing.

One of those was Indian, and the Springfield firm certainly struggled to adjust to the post-war situation. Before the war, Indian was the biggest motorcycle manufacturer in the world with the most up-to-date factory. When the firm's annual sales exceeded 30,000 machines, Indian expanded their plant and employed 3000 workers, ready to build up to 100,000 motorcycles a year. They couldn't have predicted the global sales slump which followed, nor the peculiarities of the American motorcycling market which diverged significantly from its European counterparts