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Harley Davidson motorscycles have a long and celebrated history.  The all american motorcycle has been around for more than one hundred years and continues to thrill it’s followwers with its’ inovations and longstanding traditions.

The Harley davison motorcycle started in 1901 when William Harley began designing an engine to attach to a standard bycicle frame.  Soon Harley began making plans with his friend Arthur Davidson to create a motor-bicycle.  The pari completed their first motorized bicycle in 1903.

After tier first bike they began to design a new and improved machine.  Their fisrt project wasn’t very ston and even struggled going up reasonable hills.  They enlisted help from Arthurs older brother and the motor developer Ole Evenrude.  The new invention was copleted in 1904 and they enteredit in a race. 

In 1905 they started advertising their engind to people who would like to turn their standard pedal bikes into motorized bicycles.  They created these engines in their shed and not many of them were produced that year.

The first Harley-Davidson factory was built in 1906 in Milwaukee, Wisconsin and is still the home of the motorcycle company today.  In the first year of operation the plant produced 50 motorcycles, and the following year they tripled their production.

In 1913 the original building was destroyed in order to build a bigger newer facility.  The new building took an additional two blocks of space and was heavily reinforced.

Harley entered the war in 1917 when the governmetn demanded motorcycles for World War I.  Harley Davidson produced thousands of motorcycles for use in combat during World War I. 

During the 20’s Harley-Davidson was t the largest producer of motocycles worldwide.  They were producing close to 30,00 motorcycles sod in more than 60 countries around the world. 

Harley-Davidson hosld the record to be te first motorcycle to have copleted a race at speeds averaging over 100 miles per hour in 1921.

During the Great Deperession Harley-Daveidson sales slumped.  The company had to branch out to survive.  They started producing engines to power things other than mororcycles.  They produced engineds for power plants and small vehicles to make it during the depression.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harley-Davidson