Mitsubishi Silver Pigeon

The Mitsubishi Silver Pigeon was a series of motor scooters made in Japan by Mitsubishi between 1946 and 1963. The first, the C-10, was based on a scooter imported from the United States by Koujiro Maruyama and went into production at the Nagoya Machinery Works of Mitsubishi Heavy Industries; the Society of Automotive Engineers of Japan lists it among its 240 Landmarks of Japanese Automotive Technology. With the Mizushima three-wheeled truck it was one of Mitsubishi's first contributions to the postwar personal transport boom, and its main rival was the Fuji Rabbit. A Silver Pigeon and a Rabbit were presented to the Emperor in May 1948, and from 1950 to 1964 the scooter held an average 45 percent of the domestic market. Over 463,000 were built, the 1960 C-200 selling best with almost 38,000, and Montgomery Ward sold imported examples in the United States as the Riverside.