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Dottie Mattern, Seventy-Year-Old Cancer Survivor, Rides 1936 Indian Scout Coast to Coast

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mrindian
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Inspirational Dottie Mattern rides a 1936 Indian Scout motorcycle 4,000 miles coast to coast in her seventies after surviving cancer.

Most people in their seventies are starting to slow down. Not Dottie Mattern. She’s still picking up steam. This fall the world traveler and seasoned rider trucked her beloved 1936 Indian Scout to Daytona Beach, Fla. She did it to embark on the adventure of a lifetime.
On Sept. 5, she and 102 other entrants from all over the world departed the famous beach town to begin a two-and-a-half-week sojourn to Tacoma, Wash., on antique motorcycles. She was one of only three females entered in the run that attracted regular Joes and rock stars alike, including Pat Simmons of Doobie Brothers fame.
What prompted her to do it and what was the event that offered the challenge? The second half of that question answers the first: the challenge — which is something Dottie Mattern never shrinks from. The answer to the rest of the question is the Motorcycle Cannonball Endurance Run, which is the brainchild of Lonnie Isam Jr.

Dottie Mattern riding her 1936 Indian Scout

(Photo : Dottie Mattern Official Facebook Page)
Dottie Mattern, Rider #43, rides her 1936 Indian Scout Motorcycle on the 2014 Motorcycle Cannonball Endurance Run at the age of 70

There have been three Motorcycle Cannonball Endurance Runs since 2010. It’s held every other year in large part because it’s so difficult to coordinate, and most riders need the extra time to get their bikes together between events. The ride is as tough on the 80- to 100-year-old motorycles as it is on the riders.
After hearing about the last two runs, Dottie Mattern was determined to enter herself. She began preparing the Scout in the winter of 2013. It was rebuilt from the ground up by Dennis Craig. Craig serves on The Antique Motorcycle Foundation with her.
Although she’s been riding since she was 19, and owned the Scout for 30 years, she didn’t really start to spread her wings until she retired in her 50s. She took up tennis at 50. She went to a week-long baseball fantasy camp where she was both the oldest and most valuable player at 54. 
In 1999, at age 55, Dottie decided she wanted to become a ball “kid” for the U.S. Tennis Association. After a five-week tryout, she was accepted — along with roughly 100 children aged 12 and under. She did it for six years.
It was in September of 2001 that she’d be diagnosed with colon cancer. Like everything else in her life, she approached it with steely determination.
After beating it, Dottie became active in raising funds and awareness regarding testing. She hoped to raise $70,000 for the cause before, during and after her ride.
Her experience didn’t slow her down. Eight years ago she became a U.S. Tennis Official. In 2007, at age 63, Dottie Mattern set the East Coast Racing Association land speed record in Maxton, N.C., on a stripped down ’37 Indian Scout doing 74.1 mph.
Oh, and somewhere in between all this she found time to become a vice commander with the Coast Guard Auxillary. The moral to the story? Life can begin at any age, if you let it. Ride, Dottie, ride!
Source: Dottie Mattern, Seventy-Year-Old Cancer Survivor, Rides 1936 Indian Scout Coast to Coast On Challenging 2014 Motorcycle Cannonball Endurance Run [EXCLUSIVE] : From A to B : Design & Trend

Indian 3 Wheel Patrol Vehicles

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mrindian
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Indian 3 Wheel Patrol Vehicles

by Wayne Lensu

The Indian Patrol was made in Springfield Mass in 1952 & 53. Less than 50 were made and approx 7 remain in nearly complete original condition. I have met most of the other Indian Patrol survivor owners at AMCA meets, except for one that I’ve spoken to, who is in Montana. I don’t think the Patrol’s were referred to as Dispatch Tow’s as they had the vertical Warrior 2 cylinder 500cc / 30.50″ engines rather than the V type 45″ or 74″ engine used in the Dispatch Tows. If anyone could clarify this I would appreciate it.
The Indian Springfield Patrol is direct shaft drive to the rear axle, not a chain drive, and should not be confused with the 1959 Indian Patrol Car’s, which were British built Pashleys. After the Indian name was put on the gas tanks, Pashleys were imported for sale through surviving dealerships as Indians. The Pashleys have a 350cc or 500cc single cylinder Royal Enfield engine like the Bullet and were chain drive. I have seen these English Indians at the Wauseon, Oley and Eustis, AMCA meets.
Indian Springfield Patrols, 841’s, and the 2 prototype experimental Fours are the only shaft drive Indians ever manufactured.


There is a Patrol illustration on page 17 of Bob Stark’s Catalog (shown below) and I drive mine to Bob Stark’s spot each year at Davenport to talk with him. Most bike fans have not seen one of these running in 30 years or more. I first had mine drivable at Oley in 2008 and also rode quite a bit at the Rhinebeck National meet. I had the Patrol at Wauseon that year but could not start or drive it because of a sheared woodruff key in the primary drive, which I was able to repair in time for Davenport. The woodruff key in the primary drive has to be the weakest link in this drive train.
I drove a Patrol in 1958 in Far Rockaway, NY and when I saw this Patrol listed on Ebay in 2003, I had to get it. Bob Shingler told me he had put this Patrol together from Ann Arbor, Mich. Police storage yard parts, then it went to Pete Bollenback for his museum, then to an owner in Louisiana who listed it on Ebay. The Patrols are complicated to work on and every repair involves figuring out what off of the shelf or then available parts Indian used to create this mechanical nightmare. When I work on mine, I often stop to wonder how desperate Indian was to have a machine to compete with HD Servicars. I’ve been told that HD dealers offered handsome trade in prices to get the Patrols off the road and then scrapped them, saving only the engines. You may have heard of the six V-twin,Scout 45 cubic inch engined Dispatch Tows made in 1951, I know several of these owners and those 6 with the less than 50 Patrols represent all of Indians 3 wheel production after 1942.


Indian Patrols are a 500cc Warrior from the seat post forward, the primary cases are unique and made for the combination 80″ Chief and 249 compensator using a 3 row sport scout chain. The chain tensioner foot was made up to fit the wider primary cases which also have a larger pocket for the chief size compensator. There is no clutch, just a 3 row sprocket which drives through a Boston Gear angle drive box using Indian 4 cylinder gears. That box was modified to fit around the seat post. The bell housing is stamped 102-S and the flywheel housing is stamped 103-S. They are from some unknown brand, (which I would sure like to identify), using a Crosley clutch, mystery aluminum flywheel, Crosley T92 trans and rear end with 1952 Studebaker Champion hydraulic brakes. The only electric start Indians were the 1952 -53 Patrols and the 1914 Hendee Special. The only Indian shaft drive models are the 841’s, Patrols and the 2 experimental Four cylinders.
Besides the 1914 Hendee Special, this is the only other, from the “factory”, electric start Indian that was made and is “only electric start”, no kicker at all. It has a car type electric starter using a large 6 volt group 1 car battery. The Patrol also has hydraulic brakes like the six rare Scout 45” V-twin 1951 Dispatch Tows that Indian put together in 1951, which are kick start only. After 1942 Indian didn’t have any 3 wheelers to compete with HD’s Servi-Cars until they started making these models in 1951 – 1953

Maintenance is difficult because of the way these were put together, plus there are no Patrol repair manuals and little information available. It took me 2 years to discover the gears I needed for the Boston Gear angle drive box, were standard Indian Four cylinder spiral bevel gears, which drive the car type flywheel and single plate Crosley clutch. I am still debugging this machine, getting everything operational and not concerned with cosmetic restoration yet.
When I got this bike there were two non-consecutive teeth missing from the large gear in the angle drive box. Because they were spiral bevel gears some teeth always seemed to be engaging. After a two year search I found the gear I needed on Rocky and Toney’s table at Davenport. Toney said it was the large gear from the Indian four cylinder 18×27 tooth pair. My guess is that those who tried to get this running before I was able to, failed when each time the gears would lock up, the flywheel would stop causing the woodruff key in the primary to shear. Since this was only an electric start machine the key had to be replaced for each try.
Someone in the past had also left the spring to cam thrust washer out of the torque compensator assembly, so that only the small weak spring was pressing against the sliding cam. The large Chief spring was pressing against the sprocket itself and lifting the primary chain off of the teeth. This cam setup will not travel over center or ratchet, but the back and forth hammering from just the weak spring pressure was also beating on the key.
After installing the new gear, correcting the compensator problems and chamfering the flywheel pilot bearing counterbore so that the inner race was free to turn, everything looked good.
I cleaned the gas tank which was loaded with paint overspray, rust and some kind of dark gray sealer, thoroughly cleaned the Amal carb and was finally able to keep the engine running for more than two minutes.
The magneto cam advance weights were also sticking, causing a second engine start with fully advanced timing. When advanced this would kick back also hammering that poor woodruff key. I replaced the magneto with a distributor so that starting and timing are now much easier.
The shift mechanism is another ongoing problem that needs some modification work.
My Patrol was in an article in the Perkiomen Chapter newsletter in Sept. 2008, Walneck’s Classic Cycle Trader for Sept 2009 and also in Steve Blankard’s last column in the AMCA Quarterly a year ago. I think that was the winter 2009 issue.
I have displayed my Patrol at; Oley in 2008, Davenport 2008, the Rhinebeck Timeline in 2010 and the 2010 Davenport Vertical Models Lineup and drive it as much as possible at swap meets.

Here’s a list of some of the unique Patrol parts.
Handlebars – are 7/8″ with a collar welded on for the left hand 1″ throttle.
Front wheel – is laced with a stronger 741 rim.
Torque compensator – is a combination of 80″ chief and 249 scout. The chief type hex nut is a left hand thread and uses a hidden, under the spring, set screw instead of a lock nut. If the set screw is not backed out, the quill threads are stripped off when removing the nut making reassembly difficult.
Primary cases – are wider for the three row chain and have one less screw where the large compensator hub was added. The chain tensioner foot was made up for the three row chain.
Boston gear angle drive box – was milled out to clear the seat post, the typical mounting flanges were cut off and slots were cut for the large gear to be put inside. Indian used standard bearings and seals, but made the shafts to use the four cylinder 18×27 gear set.I ground off a few interior webs, drilled and tapped a few jack screw holes in the left side cover to make future disassembly easier.
Flywheel housing – is stamped 103-S, but has to be from some available engine as Indian made up a 1/4″ steel plate to use it. I WOULD SURE LIKE TO KNOW WHAT IT IS FROM.
Bell housing – is stamped 102-S, After watching Ebay for years one of these finally showed up and I haven’t a clue what it was used on. IF YOU KNOW PLEASE TELL ME
Flywheel – is an aluminum casting or forging that must have been an available part. It uses four mounting bolts, while Crosley only used three. If Indian made this up themself, I would expect something fully machined from flat stock with no obvious grain or surface roughness. IF ANYONE CAN IDENTIFY THIS PART – I WOULD SURE LIKE TO KNOW.
Starter – is CCW drive and was made especially by Auto-Lite for Indian Patrols.
Generator – is also CCW rotation and came from a Galion road grader.
Trans & Rear – Crosley – with a short aluminum casting instead of the long torque tube.
Rear brakes – hydraulic 1952 Studebaker Champion
It is easy to see where repairing these Patrols became impractical, leaving them abandoned like the bunch of parts Bob Shingler found in the Michigan Police yard. Bob put the one together that I own now. Luckily I was able to spend several hours listening to him at Davenport. Bob also had an awesome collection of literature and early Patrol magazine ads that I hope have been saved.
If anyone has any old pictures or information about these rare 3 wheelers I would be glad to contribute toward document copying costs.
There was some interesting dialogue on the Virtual Indian website pertaining to an Indian Warrior based Dispatch Tow that showed up a few years ago at the Pennsylvania flea market for Das Awkscht Fescht. This same un-restored machine is in the Oley picture attached to this article. This un-restored bike was the very same Patrol that Jim Garrett owned and drove as a 17 year old, he bought it back and he is restoring it now.
The first picture attached is me, Wayne Lensu, at Davenport in 2008 with my drivable 1952 Patrol. The other pictures show some of these unique parts used assembling the Patrols.

George Tinkham’s WWII motorcycle on display at Lincoln museum

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mrindian
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By Tara McClellan McAndrew
Correspondent Posted Jun 16, 2019 at 7:22 PM Updated Jun 16, 2019 at 7:22 PM

Why you should know him:

George Tinkham, a Springfield attorney and motorcycle collector, has a motorcycle manufactured for World War II in the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum’s current exhibition marking the 75th anniversary of D-Day. Tinkham bought his 1942 Indian model 841 through eBay.

What was your motorcycle made for?

“Solely for desert warfare during WWII. It’s a very specialized type of war equipment. (The Allies) knew there’d be fighting in North Africa. They suspected they might fight in the outback in Australia, so they needed a motorcycle that could handle the abrasive environment of a desert. … That’s why (it was made with) the shaft drive, where you have your entire drivetrain sealed against the outside environment.”

To protect from overheating, “it had air-cooled V-Twin engines.” To decrease the effects of a bumpy ride, it had rear suspension instead of the common rigid frame. So the soldier could keep his hands on the handlebars, “they used a hand clutch — you just reach out with your fingers to pull in the clutch, and a foot shift — you shift the gears with your foot.”

Was your bike used in the war?

“I wish I could say this was a pivotal piece of machinery in Patton’s march across the Sahara, but I can’t. … (The bike’s) history was lost when the person two owners ago bought it, we think at an auction, but he did not keep great records. Whether any Indian 841s actually came close to seeing action is unclear.”

When did you learn about this type of motorcycle?

“When I was a farm kid back in the ’50s, I didn’t understand why motorcycles had the design they did. I thought, ‘Why don’t they put the cylinders out in the air where they belong, sideways, so they could get cooled? Why don’t they use a shaft drive?’ When I was older, I found out that Indian made such a motorcycle and owning one was one of my dreams.”

What condition was the Indian in when you bought it?

“It ran horribly, but it did run. I was excited to have it, but I realized I had a real project on my hands.” Tinkham’s been working on the bike ever since and can drive it now. “I tell people, ‘The bike’s a bit rough, but everything’s there, everything works. It starts first kick and I wish I could say the same thing about me.’”

What do you use the bike for?

“I use it for numerous displays, not static displays. I think a motorcycle is a dynamic piece of art, so it’s better appreciated in motion. We have local motorcycle events, like the ABATE Freedom Rally, the Vintage Iron Riders Park and Display at the Springfield Mile races … and having it at the ALPLM is a way for me to share it with the world.”

1948 Indian Big Base Scout Restoration

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mrindian
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If Invercargill man Hamish Alan idolises anyone, it would be the Indian Wrecking Crew, a group of three motorcycle racing champions who rode their Indian Scouts to victory against Harley-Davidsons in the 1950s. Alan tells reporter Hannah McLeod how images of one of them racing inspired him to build his very own Indian racing bike.

I’m the only gearhead in my family but my love of bikes probably began when I was a kid, riding a little Benelli, or with my dad’s old Indian motorcycle, which was in our garage under a bit of canvas.

My brother, sister and I would pull the sheet off and sit on it, bouncing up and down, pretending we were riding it, as kids do.

I think that old motorbike was a bit of an impulse buy of Dad’s. It never ran during my lifetime, until I was about 18, when I decided to restore it.

I had to outsource a lot of the work because I simply didn’t have the skills.

But a few years ago I saw 1950s race photos of another Indian motorbike, which I decided I wanted to build.

Fortunately, in my 20s, I quit my day job and started an adult apprenticeship as a fitter-turner, purely so that I could develop my skills to work on motorbikes.

I’ve built a 1948 Daytona Scout. The body’s almost entirely original, but the engine is reproduction. I’ve managed to do most of the work on this myself, with a little bit of help from local man Ray McCulloch.

I hate to think how much it’s cost me. There’s a pile of receipts I haven’t even looked at, but that’s not the point.

This weekend, I’ll be racing it for the first time at Teretonga as part of the Burt Munro Challenge. I’ve had a couple of test runs, and I’ve already figured out I’ll never be satisfied.

I’ll probably rebuild this bike three times over to reach my goals of developing the engine and getting to a good top speed.

Racing in the United States. these bikes could do 120mph, but they had been rebuilt in aluminium, not steel.

This bike won’t get up there – it has brakes!

But, eventually, I’ll probably start developing my own skills so that I can work with aluminium and continue working on this bike.

I’ve owned fast road bikes before, a Honda and a Ducati.

Problem was, I was getting faster and faster on the road, and I was probably pushing legal limits.

While I certainly respect and appreciate Burt Munro’s achievements and his Munro Special, his Indian was a land speed bike, not a racing bike.

Mine looks like an everyday motorcycle but it’s built for the track.

You can do things there that you can’t do on the roads legally

New Beginning at end of Indian Bike Trail

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mrindian
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New Beginning at end of Indian Bike Trail

Motorcycle Restoration part of nostalgia trip

BOULDER (AP) — A growing band of once nearly extinct Indians is being resurrected in Boulder, some restored from rusting graveyards while others quietly survived the decades until their time had come again.
Not the red-blooded variety of hos­tiles these, but iron and steel Indian motorcycles built at the old Wigwam factory in Springfield, Mass., before the firm went bankrupt in 1953, leav­ing Harley Davidson as America’s lone motorcycle manufacturer.
“Save a piece of America — restore something,” is how machinist and tool-and-die maker Jeff Grigsby explains why he got into his growing business of restoring the old Indians to better-than-new condition.
Grigsby, born the year Indian went broke, says his customers are a “well-to-do crowd” since his inside-out restoration jobs run $7,000 to $9,000 on the Chiefs, the big 74-to-80 cubic inch V-twin Indians.
Back in the 1950s after Indian went broke, a dollar-short generation of young riders bought up those big, graceful but distressed Chiefs for $150 to $300. They hacksawed the full-skirted fenders into bobtails and destroyed them in street-drag duels with the quicker, lighter British bikes then flooding the market.
Only a few Indians survived.
Grigsby says there are more than 20 of the Indians running around the Boulder area now, ranging from well-worn to concourse condition. They in­clude the rare Indian 4-cylinder ma­chines, mostly the big V-twin Chiefs, and even a 1915 Power Plus twin.
One of those Indian riders is Eldon Arnold, 58, who bought his 1950 80-inch Chief 23 years ago and now has about 60,000 miles on it.
“You can’t wear them out. With a little extra care they’ll run forever. As the years went by, the Indian got more valuable and I hated to go out on the road with it. And at one time, parts were hard to come by. But they’re being duplicated again now,” Arnold said, summing up the nearly three decades since Indian went broke.
Ninety percent of American motor­cycling today is done on Japanese bikes. Grigsby thinks increasing inter­est in the old Indian bikes is because they were American-made and repre­sent a vibrant, classic era in motorcy­cling.
“It’s a study of history, of American engineering,” Grigsby said of the In­dian bikes who battled Harley, Excel­sior, Henderson, Pope and Cyclone for race track and sales supremacy during the golden age of American motorcycle production.
Indian began production in 1901, won the nation’s first motorcycle race (a 10-miler at Brooklyn, N.Y.) in 1902, then entered international Gran Prix racing and swept Britain’s Isle of Man 1-2-3 in 1911.
Every U.S. national motorcycle championship in 1928 and 1929 was won by an Indian.
“A Harley rider looked on an In­dian rider like a racist thing. It was blood for blood back then and Indian still held all the speed records — and that determined the sales of a lot of motorcycles,” Grigsby said.
“The Indian is a rarer breed (than Harleys a desirable unit. People that rode these bikes when they were young now realize they can get one in better than new condition.
“I guess it’s a compensation to give up a gas-eatin’ hog for a piece of clas­sic transportation that gets 60 to 65 miles to the gallon on regular,” Grigsby added.

At 27, Grigsby is an 11-year veteran of motorcycle mechanics. He dropped out of school at age 16 to attend a Har­ley Davidson factory mechanics school and then took a job at a Los An­geles Harley shop.
He took his four-year machinist’s apprenticeship in Boulder with Ed Gitlin at the shop where Grigsby still does his machining trade.Grigsby had balanced, tuned and blue-printed Harley V-twins for sev­eral years before “I fell into a large in­vestment of close to 40 Indian motorcycles three years ago.”
Since then he has restored five of the Indians, with three more under­way for completion in March. He hopes to expand to 12 at a time for the next batch. “Everybody that sees ‘em, wants ‘em.”
Partner in the effort is Jim Arnold, Eldon’s son, who restores the Indians’
instruments, speedometers, switches and does all detail work.
Grigsby says his Indians go through five stages of complete dismantling and reassembly. The final finish and fit is more like that of a hand-built Italian Ferrari than the original, pro­duction Springfield Indians.
Grigsby replaces plain bronze bush­ings with needle bearings wherever possible, Teflon-coats engine parts, mirror polishes combustion chambers and improves on the original lubri­cation system.
If the Indian was such a classic, why did the firm go belly up?
Cycling historians say loss of World War II government contracts when the military opted for the Jeep instead of courier motorcycles and a fatally flawed new British-style engine mar­keted after the war — it consistently blew main bearings — led to Indian’s defeat.
Now, 27 years later, restorers like Grigsby and Arnold at shops scattered across the country are bringing the last remnants of the old Indian line back to showroom condition as Amer­ica’s nostalgia kick moves into the mo­torcycling arena.
And after so many moons, the end of the trail for Indian has become a new beginning.

Editors Note:This reprint is from 1980. Jeff is still active with building musem quality Indian Motorcycles. He is one of many rebuilders who have kept the brand alive!

Text on the button

Hap Alzina – Indians Man of the West

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mrindian
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Hap Alzina (left) poses with race winner Earl Armstrong (center) and Cannonball Baker after a 300-mile race in Tacoma, Washington, in 1915.

It was 1949 and Indian Motorcycle was struggling. It was so bad that the company could not fulfill the orders it had from, all-important police and other commercial entities. West Coast distributor Hap Alzina got the news and selflessly shipped huge stocks of parts he had in his West Coast warehouse, just so Indian could build bikes to fulfill its orders. Then, not long after that, Alzina learned that Indian was to the point of being so cash strapped, it wasn’t going to be able to meet payroll. Again, Alzina went into action to try to save the manufacturer, by placing a massive advance order, well over his normal allotment, just so Indian would have an instant cash infusion and be able to pay its employees.

Alzina’s ardent devotion to Indian motorcycles went back to the early years of America’s first major motorcycle company. When he was just 15 years old, he bought he first Indian and he loved it. So much so that when he was 17, he took a job as a mechanic for an Indian dealership in San Francisco and quickly worked his way up to service manager.

Born on September 14, 1894, Loris Alzina’s interest in motorcycling began early in life. As a boy he bought his first motorcycle, a Reading-Standard, for $50. In 1909, Alzina’s family moved from Santa Cruz, California, to San Francisco. There, he bought his first Indian from C.C. Hopkins, who was the Indian distributor for Northern California at the time. It was for Hopkins’ agency that Alzina began working for Indian.

Alzina spent 56 years devoting himself to motorcycling. Involved in motorcycling from its infancy, he is best known for being the western states distributor for Indian and, later, BSA. He oversaw the sales of those brands during the height of their popularity. Alzina — who earned the nickname “Hap” from his good-natured attitude — also sponsored many of the top AMA professional racers.

In the early 1910s, racing was becoming increasing popular and Alzina tried his hand in competition. He did some flat-track racing, but his primary interest was endurance runs. Alzina raced in many of the early desert city-to-city runs that were popular at the time. In 1919, Alzina edged well known racers Wells Bennett and Cannonball Baker to win the prestigious San Francisco Motorcycle Club Two-Day Endurance Run. That was a huge upset victory over two very popular racers. Of the 30 starters in the 680-mile endurance event, only seven riders managed to finish. Competitors had to battle against rain, hail, snow and even a landslide during the February contest. One rider slid off a muddy wooden bridge and was injured when he fell into the creek below. Alzina overcame those obstacles to earn a perfect score, riding an Indian sidecar outfit. Bennett, riding an Excelsior and Baker, on a factory-backed Indian, were on solo machines.

Alzina’s 1919 endurance victory was his biggest achievement as a competitor and it made him a popular name by way of win ads in motorcycle magazines across the country.

A few years before his big race win, Alzina opened his own dealership, selling Reading-Standard and Cleveland motorcycles. That enterprise was short-lived due to the onset on World War I. After closing his shop, Alzina again worked as sales manager for San Francisco’s Indian distributor. In 1922, Alzina saw a golden opportunity across the Bay in Oakland and bought out the dealership of E.S. Rose. Alzina turned the struggling franchise into a very successful business.

Alzina’s business expertise was recognized by Indian. In 1925, the company assigned him all of Northern California’s distribution. The next year, he was given the entire state, and by 1927 his territory expanded to include Nevada, Arizona and Washington. By 1948, Indian sales in Alzina’s territory represented over 20 percent of Indian’s total worldwide volume.

Hap Alzina serving as an AMA racing official.
Hap Alzina serving as an AMA racing official.

At the age of 54, moved on to another business venture and bought the western states distribution rights for BSA motorcycles from Alf “Rich” Child in 1949. The growth in motorcycling over the next 15 years was explosive. Under Alzina’s direction, BSA’s western distribution went from three dealerships to 265 dealers in 20 states. The move to BSA helped keep him in the motorcycle business even after his beloved Indian failed in the mid-1950s.

Alzina was an enthusiastic supporter of racing. Many racing stars such as Ed Kretz, Gene Thiessen, Al Gunter, Dick Mann, Kenny Eggers and Sammy Tanner credited Alzina for being a big part of their success. Several of those riders worked in Alzina’s shop and were allowed generous time away to travel to races.

At one point, Alzina also served as Vice President of the AMA.

Famous for his practical jokes, Alzina once walked a horse through a plush New York hotel lobby, pushing the horse into an elevator and taking him up to a room where a party was going on. He also enjoyed marking “Private & Confidential” on the address side of post cards so that everyone would be sure to read the card.

Hap Alzina (left) with Ed Kretz (sitting on the bike) and other Indian riders and mechanics after Kretz won the Southern California TT Championship in 1939.

Alzina retired in 1965. He and his wife, Lillian, enjoyed traveling together, visiting friends across the country during their retirement years. He was given an Award of Merit from the AMA on behalf of its 70,000 members upon his retirement.

He was by a journalist if he viewed motorcycling as more business or pleasure.

“Motorcycles are a business,” he said. “But now, as you’re asking questions and I look back over the years, I call it 40 years of fun.”

Alzina died on July 21, 1970 at the age of 75. He will always be remembered as a man of integrity, honesty, loyalty, foresight, common sense and hard work. He was also a one of Indian’s most passionate supporters. He was inducted into the first class of the Motorcycle Hall of Fame in 1998.

Larry Lawrence | Archives Editor – Cycle World In addition to writing our Archives section on a weekly basis, Lawrence is another who is capable of covering any event we throw his way.

Archives: Indian’s Man of the West

Spirit of Munro rides on with John Munro

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mrindian
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 One of John Munro’s earliest memories involves him riding to school on the tank of his dad’s motorbike.

   He thinks he would have been 5 or 6. That memory is a cherished one because the bike would go on to become world-famous – while his dad would become a motorcyling legend.

   John, now 80, is the youngest of Burt Munro’s four children, and has been living in the shadow of his dad’s success since the release in 2005 of the movie dedicated to his father’s achievements: The World’s Fastest Indian.

   John, along with his three sisters, has helped Indian Motorcycles keep his father’s name alive.

   Burt Munro was a motorcycle racer famous for setting an under-1000cc world record in 1967. He spent 20 years modifying his 1920 Indian motorcycle.

   His life is celebrated in permanent displays around Invercargill, including both the Southland Museum and Art Gallery and E Hayes and Sons.

   Following the success of The World’s Fastest Indian, the Southland Motorcycle Club created the Burt Munro Challenge to honour him, his love of speed and motorcycles. The challenge is one of New Zealand’s major motorsport events.

   Ahead of the Burt Munro Challenge this year, John relaxes at home with a glass of wine and recalls his colourful childhood and “normal” family life. It was full of vacations and events and helping his dad in the shed at their family home in Tramway Rd.

   John fondly recalls working together on bikes and cars, holding a spanner on the other end of a bolt.

   His father was a hard-working man. Burt would often come home after a busy day at work, sit by the fire and read the newspaper.

   In 1945, when John was 11 or 12, his parents split and John’s mother, Florence Beryl Martyn, left the city with him and two of his sisters. He went to school in Hastings and later Napier.

   It was seven or eight years before John was reunited with his father.

   In 1953, when John was 19, he rode his Velocette, one of Burt’s favourite bikes, from Auckland (where he was living) to Invercargill to spend the Christmas holidays with his dad and other family.

   The pair continued to stay in touch.

   Once the family had gone, Burt had plenty of time to spend doing what he loved. In fact, he spent 57 years doing what he loved.

   He would devote hours to his bikes and if he was preparing for a race would work day and night.

   Burt brought a property in Bainfield Rd but was unable to build a house because he couldn’t get a permit for the type of house he wanted.

   So, not long after the second world war, when building materials were sparse and the biggest garage was 20 feet by 10 feet, he built his own garage.

   He lived in it for 25 years and John remembers it well.

   Did it have any facilities?

   “It had a lathe. A grinder. A vice. A bed. What else do you want?”

   After 25 years, Burt built a house on the property. When he sold it, the house was moved and used as a crib and another house was built.

   John was 44 when Burt died of natural causes in 1978.

   One of John’s most prized possessions is a scrapbook his father had given him, full of motorbikes, events and newspaper clippings.

   John’s life was relatively anonymous until the release of The World’s Fastest Indian. Until then, people across the world, including many in Southland, thought his father was nothing but a “crazy old bugger riding bikes in his 70s”, but opinions quickly changed when the movie was released.

   People also got to know exactly who John Munro was and, even now, he’ll get stopped in the street and asked if he’s the famous Burt Munro’s son.

   Film director Roger Donaldson made a documentary about Burt in the 1970s and, at the time, said he wanted to make a movie.

   He finally did that 30 years later.

   John recalls Roger staying with him and his wife, Margaret, going through family history and talking to other family members and people who Burt had ridden with. He spent six years writing the script and started filming in 2004.

   Burt’s children spent plenty of time on set.

   John remembers travelling to the salt flats in Utah for the first time to watch filming. He also watched a large part of the filming in Invercargill, Winton, Tisbury and Timaru.

   “I was invited to be in it. But I said to him, I’m no bloody actor. But, in hindsight, it actually would have been nice.”

   A passion for motorbikes runs deep in the family. John himself has owned and tinkered with several bikes and his youngest son has travelled the world on a motorcycle.

   Mechanics and inventing also runs in the family.

   One of Burt’s uncles, Jim, invented the Munro topdresser and the Munro seed sower and John has also patented his own inventions.

   Among those are his innovative way of insulating underground pipes for hot and chilled water, and control systems for school boiler houses.

    John was a cabinet maker, farmer, earthmover and telephone operator before starting his own heating and ventilation business. He’s still inventing but now works from home with his wife in the energy management industry.

   At the age of 80, he has no desire to retire. “My brain is working 24 hours a day. I gotta keep up with it.”

   He also has seven children (aged between 42 and 57), 21 grandchildren and 15 great grandchildren, and a great-great grandchild is due.

   John has been to every Burt Munro Challenge. He and his siblings are invited to do the race starts and prize presentations. His has carried on his father’s legacy and has been an ambassador for Indian Motorcycles since his father went to Bonneville.

   “Indian Motorcycles have done Dad proud and we all want to continue supporting that. As an ambassador for Indian, I’m happy to do that because of what they’ve done to support dad’s achievements.”

   When Polaris Industries bought the brand about three or four years ago, they wanted to build something to commemorate Burt, and got in touch with John, wanting to call a new machine the Spirit of Munro.

   “As a family, we were delighted to give them permission to do so.”

   Everywhere he goes, John says ‘thanks Dad’, because without him, he never would have got to participate in such events.

   Follow Nicci McDougall on Twitter.

Source: Spirit of Munro rides on | Stuff.co.nz

Ted Williams Custom Cycle

By
mrindian
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0

Ted Williams was out in his red barn of a work shop the other day talking motorcycles ‑ real motorcycles, Indian Motocycle motorcycles..

“Some of these things they’re coming out with today don’t even like a motorcycle at all. One looks just like a chemical toilet to me” he said. “A chrome plated Porta‑Potti.”

That is unlike the Indian, a proud American nameplate that hasn’t been manufactured for a generation but is still beloved and remains Williams’ standard by which any motorcycle is judged —— and to which none measures up.

Williams, 44, big, brawny and intense, his sandy brown hair carefully styled, his fingers as clean and manicured as a banker’s, holds forth in a surgically tidy shop behind his house on the edge of town here, earning his living looking after the health of Indian Motocycles.

“If you’ve got all day and you won’t get bored, sit down and I’ll tell you what it is about the Indian,” Williams said with a smile as he took a breather from modernizing the rear brake on a customer’s 40‑year‑old Indian Chief, the most popular and successful of the Indian models.

In essence, he said, it is the machine’s brute strength, the manly vibration of the giant V‑twin engine, the down‑home simplicity of the engineering, that make the Indian superior, in his opinion, to other makes of motorcycles.

“All the nuts and bolts are just stock items. You can go into any good auto‑parts store and buy spark plugs and other ignition parts. The only thing that’s getting a little hard to find now is tires, but you can still get them if you know where,” he said.

He then told a brief history of the nameplate. The Indian Motocycle (no R) burst onto the scene in 1901, manufactured by George Hendee and Oscar Hedstrom in Springfield, Mass.

It earned a place beside Harley Davidson as a leading American brand, going strong through World War II. But. after the war, management lost interest in the big, brute force v-twins and began bringing out new models that were beset by bugs.

English interests acquired control during the crisis, and the last 80‑cubic‑inch, deep‑throated, man‑sized Indian Chiefs were built in 1953. (That is, except that 50 were assembled from parts collected from the dusty shelves of the Springfield factory in 1955 to fulfill a contract with the New York Police Department, and five civilian Chiefs that were turned out in the same batch.)

The English owners tried for a few years to palm off various English machines by plastering them with Indian decals, but American Indian buyers weren’t fooled for an instant by such blatant forgery. The company passed into history, but the good, will among the American motorcycle community lived on and is growing.

Williams estimated that 40,000 Indians remain on the road today out of, the hundreds of thousands that wire manufactured. “But that’s more than there were 10 years ago, and there were more then than there were 20 years ago.”

People keep finding old machines and bringing them back to life, which is where Williams comes in.

He said he grew up working on Indians in his father’s Orange County garage, and after a hitch in the Navy and spells of trying such work as air conditioning repair, he ended up working in a motorcycle shop that catered to the faithful numbers of Indian owners.

Then, four years ago, he and his wife, Maureen., decided to move to rural Sutter County out of Orange County’s smog and crowding. The word got out among owners of Indians, and his trade followed him.

Owners are willing to seek him out for his skill in ministering to the fine old machines, including modifications that cure several fatal flaws in the original design and other changes that increase the engine size up to 95 cubic inches and more to make the old Chiefs dazzling performers.

Williams himself owns three Indians in roadworthy shape, a soupedup Scout of indeterminate age and a pair of 1953 Chiefs, one with a 95‑cubic‑inch engine.

“I had a Harley‑Davidson once,” he said with a note of distaste for the name of the rival make. “I bought it as a basket of parts for $5, put it together, and sold it for $50. 1 didn’t want it. I’m an Indian man.”

Editors Note: Ted Williams is still working on Indians and can be reached at: unkown

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