Today in motorcycle history, January 28, 2000

  

  


  

  Titan is named the Motorcycle of Choice for the Indianapolis 500.

  Titan Motorcycles and Indianapolis Motor Speedway officials announced as part of the agreement, Titan would produce 100 limited edition "Indy 500" Y2K Gecko Rubbermount motorcycles.  The bikes would be "available to motorcycle enthusiasts and Indianapolis 500 fans alike as the ultimate collector's piece".  The winner of the 2000 Indianapolis 500 would receive a free Indy 500 Titan Gecko Rubbermount.

  "Since Titan was founded in 1995, our mission has been to provide each customer with a unique motorcycle," said Titan Motorcycles Chairman and CEO Frank Keery. "Our products are for people who have the strength to set their own course, pay attention to detail and demand a top-quality ($$$) product. The Indianapolis 500 is the world's largest one-day sporting event thanks to people who have maintained the same principles for almost 90 years. Titan Motorcycles is very proud to be affiliated with this great American tradition."  And in another great American tradition the company went bankrupt a year later.

  The Indy 500 Gecko Rubbermount featured custom graphics, including the 2000 Indy 500 logo and an orange-and-checkered flag paint scheme. The bikes had a 70-inch wheelbase, 34 degree rake and polished billet aluminum wheels.  The engine is an 1833cc, four-stroke, 45-degree V-twin.  In other words, it looked like every other Harley clone.

  Titan Motorcycles.  Gone, but not forgotten.  Well, actually, they kind of are.

Today in motorcycle history, January 27, 1970

     

  

   

  "A town called Sincere."  Episode #43 of The Mod Squad airs on ABC.  The grooviest gang of television fuzz that ever wore a badge.

  Pete and Linc, while on a peaceful motorcycle trip to Mexico, find themselves detoured by a savage biker gang into a border town and held hostage along with all of the town's residents. The gang refuses to leave until they find out who in the town killed two of their members.  Plenty of groovy, solid, fist-flyin', motorcycle action. 

  The "gang" rides a couple of Triumphs, a Sportster and a badly customized AJS (why?).  One of the members, Chubb, has a super sweet knucklehead chop with upsweep exhaust and apes.  Perfect time piece.  It's 1970 don't forget.

  Michael Cole's military-fort flogging in the 1967 film "Chuka" ranks #15 in the book, "Lash! The Hundred Great Scenes of Men Being Whipped in the Movies".

  Peggy Lipton revealed in her memoir that she had a tryst with Paul McCartney and a "relationship" with Elvis Presley.

  Tige Andrews released a 45 on Tiger Records called "The Modfather" that has a wild looking shovelhead chopper on the sleeve.

  The Fuzz-hating, bad-ass, ex-con "gang" member Chubb is played by Lee De Broux who was, ironically, a cop in the movie Chinatown.

  Kurt, the "prez", is actor Tom Stern who starred as Chuck in "Hell's Angels '69".

  Gregory Sierra appears as a Mexican villager, Zamaron.  Sierra would go on to play the role of Detective Sgt. Chano Amenguale on Barney Miller.  He had a role in Papillon with Steve McQueeen.

  Ivan Dixon, better known as "Kinch" on Hogan's Hero's, wrote an episode of The Mod Squad. 

Today in motorcycle history, January 24, 1907

  

  

  

  Glenn Curtiss sets an unofficial land-speed record on his V-8 motorcycle.

  Aviation and motorcycling pioneer Glenn Curtiss designed and built the 269 cubic inch, F-head, V-8 motorcycle that sets an unofficial land-speed record of 136.36 miles per hour on January 24, 1907.  The air-cooled engine was originally developed for use in zeppelins!

  The forty horsepower engine was the two carb version of the Curtiss Model B-8 aircraft powerplant, one of thirteen engines listed in the May 1908 "Aerial and Cycle Motors" catalog. The engine allegedly weighed only 150 lbs and was offered for $1,200 but it didn't sell, in spite of the engine's notoriety from the speed record.
  Pretty impressive for a guy who began his career as a Western Union bicycle messenger.  In 1901 he developed an interest in motorcycles when internal combustion engines became more available.  A year later Curtiss began manufacturing motorcycles with his own single-cylinder engines.  His first motorcycle's  carburetor was adapted from a tomato soup can containing a gauze screen to pull the gasoline up via capillary action.  When E.H. Corson of the Hendee Manufacturing Company (manufacturers of Indian motorcycles) visited Hammondsport, New York, in July 1904, he was amazed (and annoyed) that the entire Curtiss motorcycle "enterprise" was located in the back room of the modest machine shop.  Especially because Corson's motorcycles had just had their asses kicked the week before by "Hell Rider" Curtiss in an endurance race from New York to Cambridge, Maryland.  "This is it?!", Corson was quoted as saying after seeing the garage for the first time.

  Glenn Curtiss remained "the fastest man in the world," the title the newspapers gave him for going faster than any vehicle, on land, sea or air, until 1911, when his record was broken by the Blitzen Benz automobile that topped-out at 141.7 mph. No motorcycle surpassed the record until 1930.

  It has been suggested that the literary character Tom Swift was based on Curtiss.  "Tom Swift and His Motorcycle", the first of over 100 books in the Tom Swift series, was published shortly after the V-8 record setting run.

  The record setting V-8 motorcycle is now in the Smithsonian's National Air and Space Museum. The Air and Space museum lent it to the Guggenheim for the 1998 The Art of the Motorcycle exhibition in New York.

Today in motorcycle history, January 22, 1970

     
   


 

  The man, the myth, the manual.  Floyd Clymer dies in Los Angeles at 74.

 
  Born in Indianapolis, Indiana, Floyd Clymer was a pioneer in the sport of motorcycling, as a racer, a motorcycle dealer and a distributor.  Unable to sit still, he was also a magazine publisher, a racing promoter, an author, and a motorcycle manufacturer.

  In 1904, at the age of 10, Floyd was selling new Reos, Maxwells and Cadillacs in his hometown of Berthoud, Colorado, to which his father, a physician, had moved the family after Floyd was born in Indianapolis.
  Clymer and his younger brother, Elmer, made an unsuccessful reliability run from Denver, Colorado, to Spokane, Washington, in 1904 that ended with their Flanders 20 breaking down repeatedly on the open plains of Wyoming and eventually being hauled to Washington aboard a railroad flatcar.   By then, however, Clymer had discovered motorcycles and he knew immediately he was hooked.
  By 1916 he had become a member of the Harley-Davidson factory team.   He set a world 100-mile record that same year, in addition to a Pikes Peak record, but was eventually forced out of competitive motorcycle riding by a back injury.   Undaunted, he turned to promoting AMA motorcycle races in the Midwest and elsewhere.
  In the mid-1940's, Clymer, perhaps unknowingly, created a new genre of journalism.  He put together a selection of photos, text, statistics, and articles on old cars first published when they were new into a single, thematically chaotic volume called Floyd Clymer's Historical Motor Scrapbook.  In the early Forties, magazines covering automotive history were virtually nonexistent in the United States, unless someone stumbled onto one of the great British publications such as The Motor or Autocar.   His widely distributed opening volume created a sensation, earning Clymer a glowing 1944 book review in Time and written testimonials from luminaries including California governor Earl Warren, Charles W. Nash and Orville Wright.

  Now seventy years later, whether you need a printed hand with your Indian, Harley, Norton, Triumph, BSA, Suzuki, Honda or any other Japanese, British, American or European motorcycle there's a Clymer manual for it.  Oh, if you need help with your outboard motor, ATV, generator, chainsaw, etc. there's a Clymer's.  Or if you just want to ogle at the Clymer Girl (there really is one). 

  Floyd Clymer was inducted into the AMA Motorcycle Hall of Fame in 1998.

Today in motorcycle history, January 21, 1970

   

    

  

  "...I don't want to die, I just want to ride my motorcy...cle."

  Breaking up the monotony of a winter's Wednesday night, Arlo Guthrie appears on "The Johnny Cash Show".  He performs "The Motorcycle Song" for Johnny, Bobbie Gentry and a full-house at the Ryman Auditorium.



  Arlo Guthrie was a huge fan, and long-time rider, of Triumph motor-sickles. The cover of his 1969 LP "Running Down the Road" shows Arlo riding a 1968 Triumph TR6.  The TR6 was proudly made in Meriden, from 1956 to 1973.  It was a wildly successful model, particularly in the US.  The competition version, a.k.a. the "desert sled", won numerous competitions throughout the late 1950's and '60's. Steve McQueen's fondness for the TR6 have been well chronicled and being compared to McQueen was "kinda cool" with Arlo.

  A track on the album, "Stealin'", was featured in the film "Two-Lane Blacktop" when The Girl jumps on a strangers motorcycle, dropping her bag and bails on GTO, Driver and The Mechanic.  A must-see movie if you've never seen it and if not, why?

Today in motorcycle history, January 17, 1967

  


  

  World Motocross Grand Prix champion rider Donny Schmit is born in Minneapolis, Minnesota.

  Donny Schmit was a wiry and determined motocross rider who emerged from the unlikely environs of Minnesota to become one of the most successful American racers ever to compete in World Championship Motocross.  Schmit was a two-time World Motocross Champion, winning the 125cc title in 1990 before moving up to win the 250cc series in 1992.  When he retired, his 15 career victories in World Motocross Grand Prix were the most ever by an American rider.  Schmit retired from full-time racing after the 1994 season and tragically died less than two years later on January 19, 1996, (the day before the Minneapolis Supercross), from complications of a rare disease called aplastic anemia.  He left a big hole in the hearts of the motorcycle world.

  In 2002 Donny Schmit was inducted into the AMA Motorcycle Hall of Fame.

  A jump at his hometown track in Millville, MN, "Holy Schmit" is named in his memory.

Today in motorcycle history, January 15, 2004

  



  




 

"The Motorcycle Diaries" is presented at the Sundance Film Festival. 

 "The Motorcycle Diaries" chronicles the pre-revolutionary days of Ernesto "Che" Guevara and his friend Alberto Granado riding a 500cc Norton motorcycle dubbed "The Mighty One" (La Poderosa), through South America on an eight month, soul-searching, life-altering journey. 

 Guevara is closely associated with  "La Poderosa", but the 1939 Norton Model 18 ( an OHV single-cylinder 490cc) was actually owned by Granado.

 The whereabouts of the original bike are unknown, but a replica is on display at the Che Guevara Museum in Alta Gracia, Argentina.

  British historian Alex von Tunzelmann, who reviews films at The Guardian for historical accuracy, graded the film an A- in "History", while giving the film a B in "Entertainment".  After comparing scenes from the film to the actual diaries, Tunzelmann penned that "The Motorcycle Diaries gets a lot right, it's an entertaining and accurate portrayal of the formative youth of a revolutionary icon."

  WTF - Eighty-one year-old Alberto Granado had an invitation to the Sundance premiere, but he was refused an Entry Visa by the United States.  On May 19, 2004 it was featured at the Cannes Film Festival and Granado was able to attend.

Today in motorcycle history, January 14, 1966

  The first Craig Vetter Series 500 fairing is sold.  The cost of looking like a serious dork with your half fairing - $78.

  The Series 500 Vetter fairing was designed to allow all Japanese motorcycles 350cc to 450cc to appear grown-up.

  I've never been sure what to think of Craig Vetter.  I find him to be a hard nut to crack.  Do I like him or loath him? 

  The "fit on every bike" Windjammer makes me blow chunks but, at the same time he did bless the motorcycle world with the Triumph X-75 Hurricane and the Triumph T160 Bonneville.  Vetter also designed the 1980 ‘Mystery Ship’ Kawasaki KZ1000-based "superbike".   Allegedly there were only ten of these built, and if you think it looks wild today, imagine the eye-poppin' reaction it had nearly thirty-five years ago!   Lying beneath his trademark fiberglass stylings were a stronger and tidied-up frame with a re-positioned steering head, new swing-arm and rear suspension, magnesium wheels and a Yoshimura four-into-one exhaust pipe.  

  So can he be forgiven for all the Windjammer fairings he brought into this world, half or full?  I almost vote yes until I'm reminded he designed the "Winged Wheels of America" fairing. The burning in my throat suddenly reappears.

Today in motorcycle history, January 13, 1974

  


  

  140 million people worldwide watch motorcycle daredevil extraordinaire Bob Gill jump an entire fleet of Ryder Rent-a-Truck vehicles in a national TV commercial that airs during Super Bowl VIII.

  On May 10, 1973, Michael Sloan Productions films Bob Gill attempting to jump a fleet of Ryder rental trucks at Masters Field, a regional airport in Miami, Florida.  Bob's rear tire touches the tallest truck...landing front wheel first on the hard concrete surface, but landing safely and riding away.  The ad created was the first to feature a motorcycle jump, the ad was voted the "Number One Action Commercial of the Year" and it propelled Ryder to the top of the rental truck industry.  The spot was so successful that Ryder bought air time during Super Bowl VIII and was viewed by over 140 million worldwide on January 13, 1974.


  Bob Gill was one of the first motorcycle daredevils to jump without a landing ramp. There were only two other known jumpers in the 1970's that were crazy enough to not use a landing ramp. Bob Pleso and Robin Winter-Smith, and they both died trying.

  On April 16, 1972 in front of an estimated crowd of 10,000, Bob cleared the 60' deep, 152' wide Cajun Canyon (outside of New Orleans, Louisiana) becoming the first motorcycle daredevil to jump a canyon on a real motorcycle, a Suzuki 400.  He also entered the Guinness Book of World Records having made the longest successful motorcycle jump of 171' over 22 cars on July 17, 1973 at the Seattle International Raceway in Seattle, Washington, in front of 20,000 screaming, drunken fans.

  Bob would take a shot at another World Record with "The Great Jump at Appalachia Lake".  On August 18, 1974, in Bruceton Mills, West Virginia, Bob Gill tries to jump 200' across Appalachia Lake.  Landing 3' short, he slams the embankment at 95 mph, planting the bike into the earth and throwing Bob into the warm West Virginia dirt.  The accident caused severe spinal injuries resulting in the loss of his ability to walk thus, ending his motorcycle daredevil career.

  Walk-shmalk: not letting his disability deter him, on July 1, 1976, a determined Bob Gill rode a hand-controlled Kawasaki 900 with a side-hack across country over 8,000 miles to 30 major cities raising $1,200,000 for spinal cord recovery and repair. The ride was from Florida to Hollywood, California.

  The result of Super Bowl VIII?  Miami Dolphins 24 - Minnesota Vikings 7.

Today in motorcycle history, January 10, 1998

   



    

   Formed from the merger of the Federation of European Motorcyclists (FEM) and the European Motorcyclists' Association (EMA), the Federation of European Motorcyclists' Associations (FEMA) is created in Brussels, Belgium. 

  From its inception FEMA has been headquartered at Rue des Champs 62, 1040 Brussels, Belgium, in the offices previously used by its forerunner FEM.  FEMA's first General Secretary was Simon Milward who had previously served since 1992 as the General Secretary of the Federation of European Motorcyclists.  The main driving force behind the amalgamation of FEM and EMA into FEMA was Neil Liversidge, the ex-National Chairman of the UK's Motorcycle Action Group known as *MAG (UK) Ltd.
  The merger created a pan-European riders' rights organization ranging from Scandinavia in the north to Greece in the south and from Ireland in the west to the Czech republic in the east.  It also brought together national organizations who continued to compete with each other for members within their own territories such as MAG (UK) and the British Motorcyclists Federation of the UK, and BVDM, Kuhle Wampe and Biker Union of Germany.

  FEMA currently represents over 350,000 riders.

  *John Mitchell is the current National Chairman of the Motorcycle Action Group (MAG).
  At the time of this writing John rides a Roulette Green Triumph T509 Speed Triple, after finally curing his addiction to Kawasaki shaft-driven fours (though he's passed that onto his wife!).