Today in motorcycle history, February 2, 1972

  


  

  By 1972 two-stroke dirt bikes became so popular that they practically weren't even given a second notice. Except by environmentalists.

  In the early days they were manufactured with unmuffled expansion chambers and were conspicuously noisy, and smoked a couple packs a day. In 1972 it was estimated that more than five million off-road vehicles (motorcycles, snowmobiles, ATV's, etc) were in use on public lands. Complaints against the expanding use of off-road vehicles caused President Nixon to issue on February 2, 1972, Executive Order 11644, calling for the regulation of motor vehicles on public lands. EO 11644 signaled the official declaration of a war for public lands that continues to the this day. Federal regulators saw the Order as a practically unfulfillable obligation to provide for appropriate and regulated use of off-road vehicles, whereas motorcyclists saw it as an effort to unfairly limit their enjoyment and eventually shut them out entirely, and some environmentalist organizations saw it as entirely unwarranted, preferring rather to see all public lands closed to motorized use.


  Although federal agencies responding to EO 11644 have strived to objectify the problem and reduce it to statistical and scientific components, the real battle has continued on an emotional level. Ironically, "On Any Sunday" gave the opponents of off-road motorcycles their most enduring weapon. Depicting the mass start of the legendary Barstow to Vegas cross-country desert race from the bird’s eye vantage of a helicopter, narrator Steve McQueen asserted facetiously that the event raised “a dust cloud that settled three weeks later over London.” Environmentalists found the image and the assertion neither facetious nor funny. Thus, the movie that helped popularize off-road motorcycling became a weapon against it. Although point-to-point desert racing was not characteristic of how most off-road motorcycles were used, the horrendous image of the start of the Barstow to Vegas race became a symbol of the destruction of which every small trail bike was thought to be capable.


  The battle over public lands raised America’s motorcycling community to a higher level of responsibility than ever before, largely through the work of the American Motorcyclist Association. The AMA put significant funding into researching and publicizing scientific techniques for the responsible management of public lands, added professionally trained staff to raise the dialogue with environmental organizations and federal land managers, encouraged its local clubs to model conscientious and responsible motorcycle use, and became the first motor sport governing body in the world to mandate mufflers on full racing machines, hoping the example would be emulated by individual road and off-road motorcycle owners. 



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Today in motorcycle history, January 28, 2013

  

  

  The 2013 Cardion AB Aprilia ART is unveiled in Prague.

  The “Cardion AB style” gala program was all about two stars: Karel Abraham and his new ART bike for the 2013 MotoGP season.


  The bike was unveiled in the deconsecrated chapel of Sacre Coeur in the historical downtown Prague, Czech Republic. Karel had tested the ART in the Valencia test after the last race of the 2012 season, but this is the first time it was unveiled in its correct livery for the year. As before, the Cardion AB team will stick with its one rider line-up with Abraham, who will be hoping for fewer crashes aboard a bike that has proven to be the CRT to beat.


  Karel Abraham, “I know that motorbikes do not run on design, but I have to say I am very excited about design this year...I feel it’s close to perfection. I am hoping for a similar level of perfection on the track. My goal is to always be one of the best CRT riders...I had a very good feeling about ART at Valencia during first testing, especially its cornering performance. We should have a better engine now and I cannot wait to ride the bike at Sepang.”


  The 2013 team was headed by Karel Abraham Sr., who also owns the Masaryk Circuit – which hosts the Czech Republic Grand Prix – and his son Karel Abraham the only rider for the team, the first Czech Republic team with a Czech rider in MotoGP.

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Today in motorcycle history, January 27, 1932

    








  On January 27, 1932, two Hungarian motorcyclists find their way into the pages of The New York Times - "TWO ON MOTORCYCLE HERE ON WORLD TOUR: Students Started From Budapest in 1928 -- Have Visited 43 Lands and Gone 65,000 Miles".






  Hungarian motorcyclist, Zoltán Sulkowsky and Gyula Bartha,  traveled nearly 90,000 miles (140,000 km) from 1928 to 1936 on a 60" Harley-Davidson JS with a right-hand sidecar, F-Head Engine and a three-speed transmission. Their travels are recounted in a book originally published in Hungarian in 1937, and finally reissued in an English translation in 2008.


  Their journey started in Hungary in August, 1928, and ended in the United States.  From Hungary they rode to these countries/regions: France, Germany, Spain, Czechoslovokia, Portugal, Italy, Algeria, Tunisia, Libya, Egypt, Palestine, Syria, Turkey, Bulgaria, Romania, Yugoslavia, the Sudan, India, the Arabian peninsula, the Malay Peninsula, Japan, China, Hawaii, and Australia. After arriving in America at San Francisco, they spent two years touring North America then another two years in South America, visiting Mexico, Cuba, Panama, Ecuador, Peru, Chile, Argentina, Uruguay and Brazil.



  From the book's press release -

  "In the years between the world wars, the two Hungarian boys set out to see the world and chose a sidecar equipped Harley-Davidson to carry them. The trip lasted almost eight years and took them through 68 countries on all six inhabited continents. This book, a narrative derived from Zoltán’s memoir, is an insight into the world as it was during those formative years when, for the first time, such a journey became possible for those of modest means. Along the way, the two companions met a number of world leaders including Mussolini, General Chiang Kai-shek, and President Herbert Hoover. This version, recently translated into English, features some of Zoltán’s original photography along with maps that follow their progress around the globe. In a way, Zoltán and Gyula were the forerunners of the modern adventure motorcycling movement, going places, experiencing life, and learning about the world they lived in, all from the seat of a motorcycle."

  Around the World on a Motorcycle 1928-1936
By Zoltán Sulkowsky. Whitehorse Press, 400 pages.






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Today in motorcycle history, January 26, 1961

 

  The January 26, 1961 issue of "The Motor Cycle" features the 1961 Ariel Arrow Super Sports - 'The most glamorous 250cc twin ever designed.".

  The Ariel Leader, and its sports derivative, the Arrow, sought to combine the virtues of speed and agility with those of cleanliness and convenience.


  Launched in 1958 and powered by an all-new 247cc air-cooled two-stroke twin with unitary transmission. The "Leader" also broke with British tradition in its frame and suspension design, employing a stiff, fabricated-steel beam instead of tubes, and a trailing-link front fork. Detachable panels enclosing the engine and most of the rear wheel extended forward to meet the leg-shields and the fairing, and fully enclose the rear chain. Announced late in 1959, the Arrow dispensed with the Leader’s enclosure panels and weather protection while remaining mechanically virtually identical. The Arrow was revised for 1961, gaining squish-band, center-plug cylinder heads while a third model - the Super Sports, universally referred to as the ‘Golden Arrow’ after its distinctive color scheme - was added at the same time.





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Today in motorcycle history, January 23, 1970

  Almost everyone's favorite daredevil, Evel Knievel, successfully clears 9 cars and 2 vans at the legendary Cow Palace in Daly City*, California.





  The jump that Knievel made here went off without a hitch. But, it's what happened after the jump that made this leap so renown.

   Evel  Knievel was outspoken about drug use in the U.S. and "outlaw" bike clubs during his career. So, at this particular event, a group of patch-holders gathered and after being verbally abused by Knievel, nearly cause a small riot after someone threw a tire iron at Knievel. Security was able to restore peace, but it cast a shadow over an otherwise successful event.




  *Daly City is home to the world famous Hilltop Beauty School, located at 6317 Mission Street.  Telephone: (650) 756-2720 or (650) 992-4949,  Fax: (650) 756-0236.





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Today in motorcycle history, January 21, 1983

    


  

                                  T140V AEA34393.  

  Black clouds line the horizon. The Meriden Cooperative build their final T140 Bonneville.

  The debt-ridden Meriden Cooperative briefly flirted with buying the bankrupt Hesketh Motorcycles, and even went so far as to badge one for a marketing trial. Despite also touting a 900cc prototype water-cooled twin at the 1983 National Exhibition Show to attract outside investment, Triumph Motorcycles (Meriden) Ltd would claim bankruptcy on August 23, 1983.

  In 1984 the T140 production rights were licensed by the new owner of Triumph, John Bloor, to Devon-based engineer Les Harris who produced 1,300 complete motorcycles at his Newton Abbot factory between 1985 and 1988 when the license was not renewed. For the rest of eternity these bikes will be referred to as "Harris Twins".










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Today in motorcycle history, January 20, 1998

  

  Rastus was a jet-black, Canadian-born Bombay/Burmese cat. Max Corkill was a biker from New Zealand, toiling as a sheet-metal worker in Vancouver. At a swap meet in 1989 a young girl asked Max to look after her kitten while she went to look at something, but she never returned. Corkill took him home, ran an ad in the local paper and even on the radio station, but no one responded.  So, he decided to keep the cat and after considerable thought, he named the kitten Rastus. A few weeks later Max found Rastus asleep on one of the bikes in his workshop, he started it up to see whether the cat would get scared and jump off — but he didn't. So Max took the bike, with the cat, out for a slow ride around, and Rastus loved it, leaning forward with his front paws on the handlebars and back paws on the gas tank. Before you knew it the two became inseparable.

  Whenever Max rode, so did Rastus. A leather cover was made to fit over the tank of whichever bike they were riding (for comfort and to give a better grip) and before long he also had a specially made little helmet and a red bandana. Then they hit the road, in North America alone he was said to have covered some 75,000 mles. For the longer journeys, instead of his customary position of leaning into the wind on the bikes gas tank, Rastus would ride in a specially-made zipped pouch mounted on the tank in front of Max, with just his head peeping out.

  In 1994, after his years in Canada, Corkill returned to his native New Plymouth, New Zealand, to be near his mom and, of course Rastus went too. Once they got settled, the pair devoted time to raising money for animal charities. Max formed a company to market souvenirs such as T-shirts, posters and badges (the latter sold out). They even had a joint checking account, with Rastus' signature being his pawprint, also used on some of the merchandise. The duo visited schools to tell children about the importance of caring for pets; they were invited to various functions; they starred in an award-winning television advertisemnt for the Bell Tea Company. "The cat was just like a person,' said Bell CEO John Mahoney. 'He used to come into the offices here and make himself at home. He would drink tea with milk out of a cup and would get quite testy if it was taken away before he had finished!"  There was a thriving Rastus fan club, and the pair became a familiar sight on the roads around Taranaki and New Plymouth, often on Max's classic 1952 Sunbeam.

  At Christmastime each year Max would put on a Santa outfit and disguise a bike as a sleigh, while Rastus sported a special helmet with little reindeer antlers attached. They would take part in a Toy Run, organized by a local bikers' group who collected toys along the way for disadvantaged children. In some ways the cat was said to behave more like a dog, obeying Max's commands and 'growling' replies, rather than meowing.

  On the morning of 20 January 1998, they were riding Max's custom black BMW, with his partner Gaynor Martin. Their bike collided head on with a car coming round a bend on the wrong side of the road; all three died instantly. Rastus had been in his pouch on the tank. The 31-year-old car driver turned out to be drunk, and was charged with two counts of manslaughter.

  An amazing crowd of over a thousand bikers came to pay their respects and take part in the funeral procession. They were cremated together, as Max had wished. Their ashes were scattered by Max's eldest son at a ceremony on Mount Egmont, a mountain they both loved and that Rastus had been the only cat to climb. 

  At the scene of the accident three white crosses were erected at the roadside, the smallest one for Rastus had a black wooden cat with a red bandana attached to it.

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