One of my uncles did a lot of the hard work and traced our family history as far back as we can go, which is England in the late-1500s. From there our ancestors eventually emigrated with other Puritans to New England, where several generations of our family prospered as smiths of one kind or another or—strangely, it seems to me—as men of faith. Both vocations suggest that attention to detail was a family characteristic; and not far removed from that, I would suggest, is loyalty. So I was not surprised to learn that during the American Revolution most if not all of the males in my family enlisted with various British regiments. There is a suggestion that one young fellow was a spy as well as a soldier. He drowned in Lake Champlain while on some sort of clandestine adventure. At the war's end, the rest of my family settled in Ontario with other United Empire Loyalists. Several centuries later, we're still mainly in this neck of the woods.

I appreciate how impressive that must sound. But what intrigues as well as amuses me now, in the context of scooter restoration, is the combination of smiths and reverends in my family history. My father and his brother were engineers; my grandfathers were carpenters; and the rest of us have taught ourselves enough to tinker away (perhaps more than is wise or profitable) at various projects. I suppose, too, we have faith—not least of all that we can teach ourselves to do something. Not to forget that one curious family member who was our own "Reilly, Ace of Spies," we might also be entertained by uncertainty.

How any of that matters—at least to me—is that handiwork, faith, and a willingness to dig into mysteries are requirements of restoring an old scooter. Toss into that mix a keen interest in family history and one shouldn't be surprised that from almost the moment I got my hands on my strange little scooter t I wanted to explore its genealogy.

SOME BACKGROUND
I learned soon enough that, contrary to popular opinion, motor scooters were not an invention of post-war Italy. By the late-1800s, you could purchase a motorised bicycle with a step-through frame and no pedals. Decades later, during the Great Depression, scooters enjoyed tremendous popularity not least of all in the United States, where advertisements hailed their "go-forever-on-a-teaspoon-of-gas" fuel consumption and inexpensive operating costs. "Cheaper than shoe leather," shouted ads for a model of the US-built Cushman scooter. Well before the start of the Second World War, all the basic characteristics of the modern motor scooter were established: a small engine placed next to or above the rear wheel; a step-through chassis; bodywork to protect the rider; small wheels; and an automatic transmission available on many models. In fact, scooters were sufficiently commonplace that wartime production included numerous variations—including some that folded—for parachute regiments and ground forces. Military scooters continued to be manufactured for some time after the war ended.

But it's true the "golden era" of scooters really started when the Vespa and Lambretta models first appeared. Their styling influenced scooter design around the world for decades. Today, they are at the forefront of what are regarded as "classic scooters"—a term intended to differentiate the post-war scooter designs from those that were developed later, starting in the 1980s.

Of course, other scooters originating from outside of Italy are just as entitled to be called "classic." The Heinkel Tourist is an example. It was a great tank of a machine, but still somehow stylish and it performed admirably. (Peter S Beagle and a companion rode a pair of Heinkels across America in the 1970s, an adventure that Beagle recalled in his wonderful book I See By My Outfit—a must-read for scooterists.) Many models produced in Japan in the 1940s, 1950s and 1960s are regarded as classic scooters also, even though some companies took liberties with tradition. The 90cc Fuji Rabbit produced in 1946 was one of the first mostly plastic scooters offered to the public. Incredibly, there are still a few Rabbits out there—and fan websites to prove it.

Another landmark Japanese scooter was the Mitsubishi Silver Pigeon, which first appeared in 1947. It came with a 100cc engine and was wildly popular for a short while. Honda followed a few years later with its first foray into the scooter scene. In 1952 the company released its 50cc two-stroke F-type "Cub," which was produced in large numbers.

Then in 1960 Yamaha came out with its first scooter, which it named simply "SC-1." It was large enough to easily carry two passengers, weighed 123kg, and it came with an air-cooled two-stroke 175cc engine. However, it was not very successful. One reason often given is that Fuji and Mitsubishi commanded too much of the domestic scooter market. But so, too, did Vespas and Vespa look-alikes that were being produced in Japan.

Nevertheless, what's interesting about the SC-1 is how its styling appeared to be influenced by the Fuji Rabbit combined with the look of a modified Lambretta. Yamaha would shift its designs toward more of the latter with subsequent models.

THE MODERN ERA
By the 1970s Italian scooters so dominated world markets that leading Japanese manufacturers all but gave up and concentrated on motorcycles instead. Yamaha, at least, offered its V-series of scooters, which ranged from 49cc to 72cc and 90cc models, but now they were more like mopeds, albeit without pedals. And gone were the traditional small wheels. Instead, Yamaha's V-scoots had large wheels—much like the design that the Italian-based company Aprilia adopted many years later.

But by the end of the decade, Honda and Yamaha were ready to plunge back into the scooter market in a big way. It's hard not to find a connection between their decision and the success of the movie Quadrophenia, with its soundtrack by the British pop band The Who and its colourful depiction of the scooter scene in England. Released in 1979, the movie had an enormous impact worldwide. Suddenly there was a huge demand for scooters, not least of all among young Japanese.

The new designs featured radical, futuristic styling and—recalling the success of the Fuji Rabbit—plastic body panels to reduce costs. They also had continuously variable automatic transmissions in addition to many features not commonly found on Vespa and Lambretta scooters, such as separate oil systems and automatic starters. These were truly "modern" scooters, and they continue to be called that to differentiate them from the older, "classic" designs.

Another distinguishing characteristic was the marketing umph that was invested to promote the new scooters. Honda and Yamaha spent millions on advertising. Honda took an edgy approach and featured pop stars such as Grace Jones, Adam Ant and David Bowie. Yamaha lacked the celebrities in its promotional material, but the company was just as much on board with the idea of equating scooters with being cool. The marketing blitz paid off. Scooter sales soared.

Honda and Yamaha also experimented for a while with the concept of selling scooters behind a boutique concept. Then, inexplicably, the companies started scaling back their marketing efforts. Whether that was in response to indications that sales might have peaked or the narrow margins that have always been a characteristic of scooter sales, or simply to compensate for having invested so much already, it hardly mattered: sales fell dramatically. Both Honda and Yamaha pulled their advertising budgets back to so-called "maintenance levels" and the boutique outlets were closed.

Still, the 1980s were a "golden era" for the Japanese scooter manufacturers. Yamaha had started out with stylish new 50cc and 80cc models, known as the "Salient" and "Beluga." Both seemed to borrow from the Lambretta construction and style. In particular the CV80 I am restoring appears to be a fashionable, if not also more practical knock-off of the legendary Italian scoot. But the '80s-era Yamaha scooters earned their own success. Deals were made with European companies to produce Yamaha's scooters, sometimes re-badged, under licence. Then in 1983 the company plunged into the US market, where the 80cc scooter was renamed the "Riva." Larger scooters followed. The Quadrophenia-era hype fizzled out, but Honda and Yamaha stayed in the game.

By the late-1990s, scooters were again becoming popular—without any specific media event to explain why—and new models appeared. By then, the look adopted by Japanese scooters, which borrowed unabashedly from the classic lines of Italian models, was dubbed "retro." My other scooter, a 2001 Vino—a distant cousin or perhaps grand nephew to such "vintage" Yamaha scoots as the Salient and Beluga—is routinely mistaken for a reconditioned Vespa by some of the older Italian gentlemen in my neighbourhood. Purists cringe when they hear that. Owners of classic scoots are a testy lot by nature. They disparage anything that uses plastic for body panels or has an automatic transmission.

But hey, I know my scooter's history. It goes way back. It has a family tree—just like those fancy Italian scooters.