Although beaten to the claim of creating America’s first four-cylinder motorcycle by the Pierce Four introduced in 1909, when Scottish-born brothers William G and Thomas W Henderson founded the Henderson Motorcycle Co in Detroit, Michigan in 1911, their aim was to manufacture a luxurious, reliable four-cylinder machine that was substantially better than anything else yet available in the marketplace.
While Tom Henderson ran the company, brother Bill proved to be one of the finest engineers in the USA’s early days of motorcycle development, and the quality of his designs arguably outranked anything yet made by a European manufacturer – even Belgium’s FN company, which had invented the four-cylinder motorcycle in 1904. This resulted in the Henderson brothers’ products being christened ‘two-wheeled Cadillacs’, considerably better engineered than any other contemporary motorcycle.
Henderson Motorcycle Co built 25 examples of its first Four for public sale in 1912, powered by a 57ci inline engine with an IOE (inlet-over-exhaust) aka pocket-valve or F-head format and chain final drive, on one of which their customer Carl Stearns Clancy became the first man to circumnavigate the globe on two wheels in 1912-13. His 934cc four-cylinder 7hp Henderson Model B with a single foot-operated rear brake and fully-enclosed chain final drive covered 18,000 miles in 10 months of hard riding through four continents, and with its long 65-inch/1650mm wheelbase, improved fork, a lower saddle position and a better brake compared to its predecessor, the robust, reliable Henderson gave a comfy ride, which Clancy put to good use in tackling what was recognised as the longest, most difficult, and most perilous motorcycle journey yet attempted, with no GPS, no service stations, and no mobile phone in case of emergencies!
The journey took Clancy from West to East across Europe, Africa, Asia and the USA. He didn’t have a movie made about his ride, but did manage to publish some articles about it in a weekly magazine, The Bicycling World and Motorcycle Review. Clancy had also made a deal with the Hendersons that he could set up dealerships wherever he wanted, earning a $5 commission per motorcycle sold at them. He convinced his friend Walter R Storey
