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Motorcycles

As I think back to the various bikes I owned, the one thought that goes through my head is how amazing it was I lived through them.

 

I bought my first bike at 15 1/2. It was a twin jet Yamaha 100 and I paid $300 for it. I drove it around and around the King St house waiting to turn 16 so I could get my drivers license. When Jamie Edwards and I decided one night to move the bike from his place near the high school to my house on King St we headed down the back roads of Paris and crossed the footbridge into Lions Park. While driving through the park, a dog started chasing me. I gunned it and headed for the exit. But there was a chain strung across the exit that I didn't see until it had hit the bike, rode up the forks, and grabbed me by the throat, throwing me off the bike. Almost decapitated. Anyway, I did survive that incident, as well as countless attempts to see how far I could lean one or the other of these machines over or see how fast I could make them go around corners, or fly down the Willow St hill just before the high level bridge coming into town etc. Stupid.

'66 Yamaha 100. My first motorized machine. God I loved this bike. 

'66 Honda 450. Would blow away all the 650 BSA's in town.

 

Capable of doing an honest 100 mph past the high school on Grand River St North in Paris in the middle of the afternoon. 

Rickman Honda 900. Started life as a '77/78 CB 750 Honda that Eric Taylor converted exactly as shown.

 

I bought it from Eric but didn't keep it long. I think deep down I knew what would have been coming if I had kept it. 

Bultaco dirt bike. When Carol and I were first married in '74 we lived behind the swimming pool at Lions Park and I would run it in the hills behind the house every night after work. Had a blast with it.

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