Mark Gruber wins the inaugral Dairyland Classic on June 7, 1985 at the Sheboygan County Fairgrounds’ new 1/3-mile clay oval. The race was sanctioned through the American Motorcyclist Association (AMA) as a Pro-Am event, featuring several amateur and professional racing classes combined in a single event.
Gruber won the Classic on a Rotax 500cc. Matter of fact, from 1985-2012 a Rotax powered bike won 16 of the Dairyland Classics. "Won it on a...what?!" A Rotax, son, a Rotax...
The innovative engine company was founded as ROTAX-WERK AG in 1920 in Dresden, Germany. In 1930 it was taken over by Fichtel & Sachs and its operations were moved to Schweinfurt, Germany. Not thrilled with the night-life in Schweinfurt, operations were eventually moved to Gunskirchen, Austria. In 1959, the majority of Rotax shares were taken over by the Vienna-based Lohner-Werke, a manufacturer of car and railway wagon bodies. In 1970 Lohner-Rotax was bought by Bombardier, Inc.. The former Bombardier branch, Bombardier Recreational Products, now an independent company, uses Rotax engines in its motorcycles, personal water craft, and snowmobiles.
The company only built two-stroke engines until 1982, when it started building four-strokes and aircraft engines.
In 2008, Rotax started manufacturing the 1,125cc Helicon liquid-cooled, four-stroke, fuel-injected 72° V-twin for Buell.
Speaking of Buell, if you're interested in an H-D/Buell-Rotax Speedway/Flat-tracker conversion and are lucky enough to live somewhere near Bedfordshire, UK call or stop by Maulden Motorcycle Repair in Maulden, Bedfordshire MK45 2AY. If anybody can help you with this the good folk there can .
Australia's Tom Phillis is killed on the Snaefell Mountain Course at the 1962 Isle of Man TT.
In a career that began in 1953, mostly with Norton and AJS, Tom Phillis started racing with the goal of being a World Champion Grand Prix rider and about 437 million miles away Soichiro Honda had his eyes set on his motorcycle's being successful on the world's Road Racing stage.
Phillis wrote a personal letter to Mr. Honda late in 1959, a letter by a relatively unknown Australian racer to the founder a Japanese motorcycle company.
Tom Phillis, who at the time was a private entrant on the Continental Circus with only two years’ experience, but in 1959 he’d recorded three International race victories. Soichiro Honda, who’d taken his Honda Motor Company from a $3000 venture in 1948 to an annual production of 750,000 machines – 20 per cent of the world’s total production, read the letter and was impressed enough to offer Tom a factory-backed ride. Phillis’ reward for ignoring the skeptics and playing a hunch that Honda machines would improve rapidly.
Honda's reward for giving a 25 year-old Australian the nod would be Honda's first win in a World Championship Grand Prix at Montjuich Park in Spain, and later that year, their first 125cc F.I.M. World Championship at Argentina in 1961.
Thomas Edward Phillis died aboard a Honda on Snaefell Mountain Course at the 1962 Isle of Man TT 350cc Class.
The defending 500 cc world champion, Gary Hocking, was so affected by the death of his friend that he immediately retired from competitive motorcycling.
He was cremated and his ashes were scattered at the TT race course startline.
Angels from Hell is released by American International Pictures (AIP) on June 5, 1968.
Directed by Bruce Kessler with a screenplay written by Jerome Wish. It was the first film produced by Joe Solomon's Fanfare Films, a firm Solomon had created with the profits from three previous biker films. The film was shot in beautiful Bakersfield, California with music by the legendary Peanut Butter Conspiracy*.
A former motorcycle club president, Mike (Tom Stern), returns home from Vietnam to resume his life and form a new motorcycle club. Using all his gathered experience as a war hero he tries to unite all the existing neighborhood clubs and put together a brand new, super-duper outlaw bike club.
Mike soon faces trouble when one of his club brothers murders a young woman at a "drug party" and is shot by the police. The trouble intensifies when an all-out cop against biker war breaks out.
The cast included Tom Stern (married/divorced to/from Samantha Eggar) as Mike, Ted Markland (Angels from Hell, Another 48 Hours) as Smiley, Jack Starrett (Blazing Saddles, Born Losers, Hells Angels on Wheels) as Bingham and Arlene Martel (Bewitched, I Dream of Jeannie, Man from U.N.C.L.E., Hogan's Heroes, The Monkees) as Ginger, the biker sex-kitten. Choppers, chicks, cops and drugs.
*Peanut Butter Conspiracy also recorded songs for movies including: Run Angel Run, Jud, Cherry Harry and Raquel, Hell Ride, 2000 Years Later and Beyond the Valley of the Dolls.
On June 3, 1977, Rider Insurance Company*, the only insurance carrier exclusively serving motorcyclists, opens for business.
Currently the largest motorcycle insurance provider in New Jersey and the only company exclusively serving the motorcycle community, Rider attributes it's success to the extraordinary support of their loyal customers and to the dedication of it's employees in staying focused on what they do best – motorcycles.
Working out of the basement of his home, Harry Bleiwise founded Rider Insurance Agency in 1971 because, as a new rider, it didn't take him long to realize that bikers were not being treated with the respect they deserved. Bleiwise wanted to do something to change that. His dedication to motorcyclists paid off as, over the next six years, Harry gained the loyalty of over 20,000 New Jersey riders.
In 1977, one of the largest insurance companies that Harry’s agency was placing business with pulled out of the state of New Jersey. Rather than give up on his fellow riders he invested everything that he had and borrowed the rest to come up with the capital required to start his own insurance company. On June 3, 1977 he started Rider Insurance Company.
Although for many years Rider was only available in New Jersey, in 2007, after many requests, operations expanded into new states. Rider now provides coverage to motorcyclists in Indiana, Maryland, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and West Virginia.
"While we’ve come a long way since Harry’s basement, we have remained true to our mission to serve the motorcycling community with the respect they deserve."
*This is by no means a plug for an insurance company it just so happens to be something that involves motorcycles on this particular date. No offense, but I personally don't give a crap what insurance company you use.
The Sturgis Motorcycle Museum & Hall of Fame opens.
In a joint effort the Museum's Board of Directors, local students and members of the Sturgis community, including the legendary Jackpine Gypsies motorcycle club, gathered on March 10th, 2001 to scrape, sweat, sand and paint the old church building next to the Pyramid Bar. Gene and Nancy Flagler, owners of the church, decided to charge only $1.00 a month for rent, helping to make the Museum a little easier to manage financially.
The Sturgis Motorcycle Museum & Hall of Fame finally becomes a reality, opening its doors to the public on June 1, 2001. Local bikers, celebrities and national collectors loaned the new Museum a wide selection of vintage and rarely seen motorcycles and memorabilia. The collection ranges from a 1909 Imperial to an outstanding 1965 BSA Starlite.
Harley-Davidsons, Indians, Hendersons, Triumphs, flat-trackers, full-dressers, dirtbikes and dragbikes.
The impressive collection offers visitors a glimpse into the magnificent world of two wheels.
Canadian motorcycle racer Miguel Duhamel dedicates his May 30, AMA Superbike race win at Road Atlanta to Josef Boyd and Dirk Vandenberg.
On Wednesday, May 27, 1998, the two Honda associates were killed in a tragic
accident during motorcycle evaluations at Willow Springs Raceway near Rosamond,
California.
Dirk Vandenberg, 48, Manager of Product Evaluation from
American Honda Product Evaluation and Press Department and Josef Boyd, 49,
Senior Engineer, Motorcycle Division, Honda R&D Americas, were evaluating a pre-production version of the Honda CBR600F4. At the time of the accident, Boyd was apparently standing on the track photographing the motorcycle being ridden by Vandenberg.
In what is considered a freak accident, Dirk Vandenberg, a rider with nearly 40 years of experience, somehow lost control, swirved and collided with his friend, resulting in the deaths of both men.
Josef A. Boyd, aka GL Joe, was considered the "father" of the GL1500C Valkyrie F6C motorcycle, which was a "cruiser" derivation of the Honda Goldwing.
Following their deaths the words, "Dedicated to Super Evaluators Dirk Vandenberg and Josef Boyd", were embossed in raised letters on the inside of the Honda CBR600F4's upper fairing.
