My 1948 Panhed Chopper. She wasn't a Road King!
Stories of YesterYear
My Maiden Voyage to Ottis Pierce Park in 1976
by Rocky aka Glen Gantzer
In Febuary of 1976 I went to a newly opened shop called Antique Motorcycles in Santa Clara, Ca and paid $800 for the world's worst 1948 Panhead basket case. Not one bolt and nut together in or on any parts. Heads with no valve guides, rods with no crank pin, just a big pile of parts, but with a really pretty already raked and molded frame.
I spent every penny I could and by the time of the MMA run at Otis Pierce Park I had my panhead running jockey shift and all. Now this was the first big bike I ever had. My previous being a 1973 Sportster that I bought brand new at 19 years old. My brother with his 1969 Chopped Triumph Trident and I started out to Otis Pierce. I hadn't had my panhead on the road for more than a couple of weeks and this was going to be her first road trip.
We set out from San Jose, Ca. and hit the west side of Pacheco Pass when it started to ran like all get out. My Panhead had a 14 over front end with no front brakes and no front fender. After what seemed like forever but really only about 20 minutes we pulled into a gas station off of the highway. My Mikuni Carb was sucking in water (no air filter-they weren't cool) and making the slide stick open. We pulled up to the station and I asked the guy if I could use his oil can to oil my throttle cable and being the redneck he was he said no. So I walked into the station and grabbed the oil can and a rag to keep the oil from dripping on the floor and oiled my cable. Just then three different police cars pull up from three different groups. There was a sheriff, the CHP, and a land management or someone. The punk had called them just because I used his oil in the middle of a rain storm.
The cops and I spoke and the cop said he knew the guy and he was a d---head but he had the say on his property. So we pulled our bikes across the street and laid underneath a semi parked by the street. After I think I had just passed out the Semi started up. Man did I freak out. We jumped out and banged on the truck drivers door and told him what was going on so he just stayed there until we decided to leave.
After a while we decide to take off and with the lights of Los Banos ahead we were hauling butt. All of a sudden my bike lunges sideways and tried to fall over. I stomped my foot on the ground and kept haulling. We must have been doing 80 mph just trying to make Los Banos. When we pulled up to go into the parking lot of Denny's I could barely push my bike. The front tire was completely flat. Must have blown out while we were flying in the rain. In the morning I took care of the tire and we again headed out to Fresno.
It continued to rain the entire way to Fresno. But when we got to the park the sun came out and it was nice the whole weekend. Took this time to meet up with my friend Dean at the Wheel Lords tent and let him know I now had another scooter and we had ridden to the run. This was the beginning of me getting know the rest of the members of the Wheel Lords MC.
Some time Sunday we left and headed home. When we rode up into my yard I was so happy that the Panhead had made it that I revved up the motor and dropped the clutch to do a burn out in the yard to celebrate but that is not what happened. Remember I said this was my first jocky shift? Well the rear tire was on the sideewalk not in the grass and when I let off on the pedal,the tire grabbed and I shot across the yard and stuck my front wheel right into the front yard's wooden fence. It didn't matter. At that moment I had never felt better.
Stories from Lorin aka Hawkeye
I talked to Robin (Townsend) last night and gave him the URL for the site. He was amazed and very happy that someone had brought this chapter in our lives back to "life". Thank you a million time for doing this.
I know what you mean about Brotherhood. I have been in a lot of organizations but have never felt as close to a bunch of brothers as I did there. By the way, the run up to Mount Madonna park was also where I gave Robin's bike its name. He had his, a 73 Shovelhead with 5 gallon fatbob tanks, gold with dinosaurs airbrushed on them, parked next to Kit's. Kit was absolutely stunning and clean but Robin's was dirty, as it often was, and I remarked " Hey look, it's Rosebud and Mudbud". The name stuck and his bike was known by that name from then on.
I have so many memories of the Wheel Lords and the things we did that I could probably fill a book. I remember the night that Kidd first got his knuckle running over at the "Old Man's" (Fred's) house and the look on his face when it came to life. I remember the night I brought the 57 pan home to my house and the whole club showed up to help me tear it apart. They were ofte also around to help me put it back together. The bike was the "Red Bitch", a 57 straight leg framed, shovelhead powered chopper of the "old school". I remember the night I first got her running as well. I think the whole club was there that night too! Brand new bike blowing smoke out the exhaust like a steam locamotive. We figured out a week or so later that I had plugged off the crankcase breather by mistake. Had a sportster tank and a tall sissybar on the back. A lot of people would come up to me and tell me it was a great looking Sportster. Then I told them to look at the motor again and, any that knew anything about Harleys, were amazed. It was light and fast. Had a Sifton drag cam, a large S&S carb and some other mods done by Rich at the Motor Shop on Julian in San Jose. (Rich did the mods to my current ride, a 99 Fatboy with Screamin Eagle heads, Andrews EV53 cam, etc, that makes 88 hp at the rear wheel.) Anyway, the point of this was that when I needed help, I could count on my brothers to come through and if they needed mine, I was there.
I also remember very well the campout after the MMA blood run in Sacremanto where Ron Rolloff's daughter, his son and my son discovered the keg of beer we had set out for all the people attending and were attempting to help drain it. They were all put to bed a short while later and "passed out" for the night. The next day when we left, Satan, Larry, Fred and I don't remember who else stayed behind to clean up the campgrounds. Sometime around noon Satan decided he was hungry and was going to cook something for lunch. He drained some gasoline from his bike into an empty coke can and went over to the fire pit, put some wood in it and started to pour the gas onto the wood. Evidently there were still some glowing coals under the ashes which caught the gas and Satan on fire. Fred and Larry tackled him and put the fire out. They got an ambulance out there an got him to the hospital in Sacramento. Although he suffered third degree burns to his hands and burnt most of his hair off he was fortunate that is was not worse. Dave always wore these leather gauntlets on his wrists and that day they were over the sweatshirt he was wearing. They were effective in keeping the fire from burning his arms and upper torso. A bunch of us rode up in Dink's car the next night to see him. His head was swollen and he was still in some pain but we were so glad to see our brother alive. After that Dave wore pressure bandages on his hands for quite some time. Many years later, He and I were on the same bowling league at the Oakridge lanes in San Jose. We had a lot of fun talking about the "old days" and I kept in touch with him for quite awhile. When I couldn't reach him anymore I figured that he had moved but hoped, that since he had my number , that he would call. I know now why he did not and my world is not as good a place as it was with his passing.
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