"Bike" overtakes "Bicycle"

This is the Google Ngram for the two words. Is the explanation motorcycles, or somehow Bill Clinton? And what's with the recent decline? Also check out this one.

Comments

[T]

So long as they don't have the horribly sharp turn onto the trail at the bottom like now, then I will be good with it.

[CyclingFool]

The second one is a little less inspiring if you add the word car. :(

[Sage]

I think you should look at the ngram for the two words car and automobile. You'll see there is a movement away from the formal names(bicycle, automobile) to informal(bike, car).

[Lucre]

What I find interesting is that Bike led in the period from 1800 to 1880 as well.

[washcycle]

I looked at those. Most of those are books are actually collections of documents (like all the records of some government agency) that START in 1800 but may actually go well into the 20th Century. So the references are likely in those later documents. That's how you get mentions before bicycles were invented.