Since their invention, motorcycles have endured a somewhat enigmatic presence in America. In the early years of the 20th century they evolved peacefully alongside the nascent automobile, sharing the excited flurry of mechanical invention that promised a future of rapid mobility. Leather clad riders, bent to the wind, were a kind of romantic earthbound equivalent to aviators of the period. The first hint of any potential maligning came about as the result of a horrific crash at a boardtrack event in 1912 when an errant motorcycle cartwheeled into the grandstands, killing several spectators. Newspapers reported the catastrophe without a headline, using instead the universal symbol of danger: a skull and crossbones. The high-banked oval tracks were categorically labeled “Murderdromes” by the media and quickly fell from favor with the public.
The next significant erosion of relations between motorcycles and the public happened on July 4th weekend, 1947, in a small town in northern California. Before leaping full bore into the “incident” that helped derail the public’s perception of motorcycles — sending it over the cliff of respectability — it’s important to understand the elements leading up to that fateful holiday weekend 64 years ago.
When World War II ended in 1945, America was flooded with returning GIs who had been plucked from adolescence and forced into premature manhood by the abject horrors of war. A number of returning soldiers found themselves alienated from the very America they had risked their lives for. After having been unwittingly hardwired into adrenaline by daily confrontations with death, the prospect of returning to rural America and settling back into sedate existences — expected to get their kicks now at the local soda fountain and picture show — was out of the question.
The only solace some vets found was in reuniting with their former Army buddies, embracing the intense bonds of friendship forged under fire overseas. A number of returning GIs wanted to reclaim the youth that had been taken from them and experience some of the freedom they had fought so dearly for. And what better way to wash away the horrors of war and retrieve aborted adolescence than a motorcycle? Fast, loud, invigorating, motorcycles possessed the same quintessential affirmation of life through danger they had experienced on the battlefield.
These GIs snatched up surplus military-issue motorcycles with their unspent risk pay, surgically removing the excess glut of metal in the ritual that would become known as “chopping and bobbing.” Straight pipes unleashed extra power to push the lightened bikes in profoundly robust declarations — of heightened decibels — that they had, in fact, returned from the front. Clubs formed with the same alchemy of war: a strangely unique combination of ardent independence amidst devoted camaraderie. And the motorcycle gang was born. With that came the motorcycle rallies.
It was in the small agricultural town of Hollister, 64 years ago, that motorcycles took a severe blow on the chin.
The sleepy little town was chosen as the site of the Gypsy Tour Motorcycle Rally from July 4th to July 6th, 1947. An estimated 4000 bikers descended on the unsuspecting enclave, effectively doubling its population and overwhelming the local police force’s seven officers. Over the course of the holiday weekend police made about fifty arrests, mostly for drunkenness, disturbing the peace, and reckless driving. Not a bad outcome considering the number of rowdy bikers and availability of alcohol.
Observing the event was a young, overzealous freelance journalist from the San Francisco Chronicle who embellished the situation with artful flair to secure some ink in the paper. The rally was transformed into genuine threat with his sensational headline, “Bikers Take Over Town”. The story was picked up by newspapers across the country, culminating with publication in the country’s eyes and ears; LIFE magazine. The article used descriptive words in the vein of “terrorize” — just the thing to shock well-heeled, law-abiding citizens out of their wits. The piece carried a now famous photo of a drunken, slovenly biker reclined on a Harley, a beer in each hand, the pavement below him littered with dozens of empty beer bottles. This slob became our unelected spokesperson, effectively painting all motorcyclists as inebriated hoodlums.
Hollywood, always eager to cash in on any hysteria that can register ticket sales at the box office, plucked a script from the episode and in 1953 stuck a sensational rising star on the seat of a Triumph for a movie that borrowed generously from the fabrication. When Marlon Brando rode into town on the silver screen in The Wild One, it was the last nail in the coffin of respectability for motorcyclists. This was all middle America needed; a threat made real by respected publications and a major film, capable of unraveling the carefully woven fabric of decent morality. Doors were dead-bolted and shotguns loaded as small towns everywhere braced for the arrival of the modern day, two-wheel equivalent of conquering Vikings coming to pillage Main Street and deflower their daughters.
The success of The Wild One spawned a cottage industry of exploitative “B” grade biker films over the next decade. Their redundant themes of senseless violence against the innocents served to perpetuate the general public’s increasingly negative view of motorcycles. This negativity was ushered along by the proliferation of biker gangs like the Hell’s Angels that relished their evil, subversive persona. Unlike the Hollister boys, these modern gangs were the real deal, living up to their tough, violent cinematic counterparts (and vice versa). The press had a field day.
A very interesting thing happened during this period that would serve as the catalyst for change with the public’s perception of motorcycles and the people who rode them. This vitally important turn of events came courtesy of Honda. The manufacturer’s ad agency created a campaign that painted motorcycles in a very different light. TV spots and print ads depicted the boy and girl next door zipping off to tennis lessons and college classes (with broad, white-toothed smiles) aboard their innocent Hondas. The ads introduced one of the most famous lines in the motorcycling vernacular: “You meet the nicest people on a Honda.” Brilliant. In one fell swoop, the Japanese began to extricate motorcycles from the proverbial gutter and infuse the public with the first hints of acceptance.
This groundswell of change forced the public to reconsider the established, archetypal image of the biker. Suddenly there was an alternative face that defied the scary folklore. Motorcycles still represented rebelliousness and individualism, only now it was in a more acceptable package.
This trying decade in America’s history was capped off with a biker film that broke from the earlier, severely limited cinematic conventions of the genre. Easy Rider, starring Peter Fonda as “Captain America” and Dennis Hopper as “Billy,” was the first legitimate film about bikers, presenting an unsettling theme of two men who “went looking for America, and couldn’t find it anywhere.”
In the ironically brutal ending, it’s not the lawlessness of the bikers that seals their fate, but rather ignorant citizens that unload a shotgun into the two introspective protagonists in a hauntingly symbolic role reversal. The film’s eerie theme turned the template for biker movies on its ear and ended up becoming a mantra for the counter-culture, a celluloid battle cry for an entire generation that was pushing ardently for change and revolution. Maybe it was a combination of Vietnam, the gas crisis, the economy, and the embarrassing disgrace of Watergate in the ‘70s that made Americans realize there were more pertinent threats to their wellbeing than those posed by the somewhat mythical threat of marauding biker gangs — which had failed to materialize on their doorsteps after all.
The public’s perception didn’t change overnight. There was the residue of trepidation left in the wake of the previous thirty years. But who could imagine, 64 years after the famous “riots” in Hollister, we motorcyclists would be enjoying a more acceptable, dare I say, chic, with the public. I suppose there’s some truth to the old saying; like old buildings and prostitutes, if you stick around long enough, eventually you get respect. Perhaps we’ve finally eclipsed the ill effect that infamous LIFE photo of the drunken biker in 1947 launched. Ironically the photo was revealed some years later to have been staged. The photographer had gathered the empty bottles and dressed the scene himself. Then asked an agreeable drunk, who stumbled out of a bar, to pose for the photo.