Today in motorcycle history, May 6, 1972

 

  Doug Malewicki and Evel Knievel unveil Knievel's Steam Rocket Powered X-1 SkyCycle at the Twin Falls, Idaho, Snake River canyon jump site on May 6, 1972.

 

 

  Doug Malewicki was the designer and engineer of  Evel's X-1 Skycycle and X-2 Skycycle, the rocket-powered motorcycle that was shot over the Snake River Canyon to test the viability of his Skycycle jump. 

 

  An aeronautical engineer by training, Malewicki spent much of his career working for American aeronautics and space companies: the Apollo program moon landing vehicles, the Stealth bomber, and Cessna aircraft including their first private jet airplane.  He was a model rocket enthusiast,  (one of those geeky kids in the corner of the park that people unfairly point at), becoming famous early in his career for the Malewicki Equations that predicted the altitude and coast time of a model rocket flight.

  According to Malewicki's daughter, he was the inspiration for the original one eyed monster, called Mike on Peewee's Playhouse TV show, and later to become the inspiration for Mike Wazowski drawn by Ricky Nierva in Monsters, Inc.