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Event Reports

Sturgis Vintage Day

Broken Spoke And Iron Horse Play Host To The History Of The Musical

Article By: Heather Callen

Photo By: Amelia Rose

Originally Published In The November 2016 Issue Of Cycle Source Magazine

Chris has been a member of the Antique Motorcycle Club of America (AMCA) for several years now, ever since he built “The Ticket”, our 1949 Panhead chopper, or as I call it the sexiest bike ever. But, I digress. The AMCA was founded in 1954 by four New Englanders to honor the one thing that brings us all to these pages, the motorcycle. More specifically for the AMCA is a love for antique motorcycles. Throughout the year and across the country many of the 69 nationwide chapters host meets, runs and gatherings to show their love and dedication to these vintage machines. Chris and I have a personal appreciation for what they all do, after all without the motorcycle you wouldn’t be reading this, and felt that perhaps a small acknowledgement of their hard work would be appreciated; and what better place to do it than Sturgis! We reached out to our host for the week, The Iron Horse Saloon- Sturgis, to see if they would offer up some of their prime parking space within the confines of their Legendary Lazelle St location for an afternoon to card holding AMCA members. The fine folks at the Iron Horse, knowing the effort put forth by AMCA, not only offered up the space but put together a free lunch and a few awards that would be given out at the first AMCA Vintage Days.

Now, I’ll admit that this was a last minute offering and we really weren’t sure how well it would be received. So I put out a call to my good friend and President of the Cherokee Chapter of the AMCA, Steve Klein, who very kindly put us in touch with Keith Kizer, Executive Director of the AMCA, from that point it was really on! Different members from the organization, like Carl Olsen and Rick Najera, stepped up to make sure the day was well organized and would go off without a hitch. And that it did! Rick and a few of his cohorts started the day early by rolling in three beautiful specimens… straight out of the museum! Throughout the afternoon fantastic examples of vintage iron rolled in to the Iron Horse Saloon for all to feast their eyes on. Carl Olsen kindly stepped up and took over the role of host and emcee for the afternoon. He held a kickstart competition and gave awards for the Highest IQ Rider, Oldest Machine & Rider Combo, Longest Standing Member, Best Original Condition, Most Miles On Machine and they even let us chose a Cycle Source award which went to a beautiful ’46 Knuckle that any one of us would have gladly called our own. All in all, the patrons of the Iron Horse were graced with over 40 antique motorcycles on the first AMCA Vintage Day. If you ask me, it wasn’t too bad for a last minute effort. But more importantly a meal, great stories, laughter and the love of vintage motorcycles were shared that day. If you missed this display of vintage iron in Sturgis, don’t worry there will be more and maybe even in your own neighborhood. Visit www. antiquemotorcycle.org to learn more.

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