Gottlieb Daimler

Gottlieb Daimler was a German engineer who spent his career chasing one idea: shrink the engine, speed it up, mount it anywhere. In 1883, working with Wilhelm Maybach, he designed a compact liquid petroleum engine that could be throttled - useful, at last, for moving things. Two years later they fitted a vertical version to a two-wheeler, the Petroleum Reitwagen, creating the first internal combustion motorcycle. The next year the same engine went into a coach and a boat. In 1890 they formed Daimler Motoren Gesellschaft and sold their first automobile in 1892. Daimler fell ill, returned, clashed with stockholders, resigned in 1893, then came back in 1894. He died in 1900, six years before his name ended up on the grille of a Mercedes.