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Who can tell me what kind of bike this is and approx years made?

That would be the "Neracar", Ron. Developed by Carl A. Neracher and manufactured in both Great Britain(beginning in 1921) and Syracuse, New York(beginning in 1922). It did not sell in sufficient quantities to make it financially viable(kind'a like how Jackson down in Texas thinks the new T-Bird will sell ), and thus in 1926 the investors who financed the company halted production at both facilities.

(all the information above...except for that "Jackson" part, of course ...was retrieved in my "Art of the Motorcycle" book which I purchased when I visited that Guggenheim Museum's traveling exhibit when it hit the Venetian Hotel in Las Vegas back around 2001)

Neracar. They made 2 versions, 1 in the US and another in Europe. The big difference was the engines. That is the only 2 stroke engine I've ever heard that thumps at low speed instead of ringy-dinging. The front suspension is really different with the front wheel moving on a curved bar to steer.

According to my "Pocket Encyclopedia of Classic British Bikes":
1921-1926 Early models had a 211cc 2-stroke single. Later 'Made In England' (under licence) models had a side-valve, 350cc 4-stroke single. 3 speed Sturmey-Archer gear box. 168lb. 19'6" turning circle!! Hub-centre steering. Very comfortable. Very stable.

I have books, too!!! :P

With words!!!

Dwight,
I figured you and GB would get this. Good going.

Oh, and of course the OTHER interesting thing about that machine is that(I believe so anyway) it was the first motorcycle to feature "Center-Hub Steering", an innovation that was somewhat revived in the early 1990s by the Italian firm Bimota with it's "Tesi" model, and a few years later by Yamaha, in association with motorcycle designer James Parker, with the Yamaha GTS1000, just like the one Derek Mosher(SalMaglie) currently owns down in Tucson.

(and I knew ALL o' THAT, Mr.Echoance, WITHOUT havin' to have a book in front o' me, dude!!!)

YEAH! Come to THINK of it Brian, where the heck DID all this "ight" soundin' just like "ite" stuff COME FROM anyway, HUH?! NOT to mention all that "ough" stuff not ONLY soundin' like "uff", but ALSO soundin' like "ou" TOO sometimes???

Well, I'LL tell ya where all this stuff comes from ALRIGHT!!! From them darn ol' LIMEYS over there, THAT'S where!!!

(but just you wait and see...Five'll get ya TEN they'd blame it ALL on those lousy FRENCH sittin' across that channel o' theirs over there!...wanna BET?!)

To Dwyt: Not blamin' anyone. It's a load of old Italian, Greek and Spanish anyway...what I will say is that we have surprisingly capable brains and can deal with the extra letter or 2 that our language throws us. .nlike some of yo. over there who not only deigned to steal o.r lang.age (actally, it was .s who did that) b.t then yo. go and 'simplify' it. S.rely this tells the world a co.ple of things abo.t Americans???? PLUS, you can't even pronounce it properly, 'speacially tha-ose frow-warm tha Souwath.

My ex's pronunciation of mirror=mrrrrr

Oh, and you owe me 5 bucks. :P :P :P

On a side note, should Emily Proctor happen to be reading this, none of the above applies to you. In fact, I would quite happily listen to you talk all night long. Mmmmmm.

OK.
Just to clear the etymology up (a little).
As mentioned, English has roots from many different languages. Even different types of languages: Nordic, Indo-European, Semitic, Romance, Celtic, Native American, etc.

The spoken language changes much faster that the written form. Thus these superfluous letters were at one time, pronounced.
Now, in the original languages the letters may have different pronunciations than they do in English which may well explain why they are silent.
An example is "kn". We pronounce it as the letter "n" with the "k" being silent. It originally had a sound which combined the two as did "gn" "gh", etc., etc.
As these sounds were difficult to pronounce, they changed to a simpler pronunciation.

For a current example of how this phenomenon happens take the word "often". Some people pronounce the "t", some don't. And either way is correct.

Now you know much more than you probably wanted to


Something for the word geeks.

Well, THANKS for clearin' that up, sir!

(ya no, I've offen said, if ya wanna no about the history of this language, Bill's yer boy!)