Written By Kenneth Kinder
It seems like only yesterday that I was trail riding on my old trials or enduro motorcycle. I first started this type of riding on my old Matchless 500 single, and then we called it cowtrailing or boon-docking. My first riding partners were a couple of loggers, Henry Hammock and Jack Montgomery. They heard about me having a bike and immediately came down to Sacramento and made a down payment on two motorcycles. Make a down payment is exactly what I mean, because they never made another payment. They lived so far back in the woods that the finance company couldn’t find them to repossess their bikes.
These two guy’s were evil, mean, and nasty. On most occasions they were as honest as they could be; but they had this strange way of justifying not making payments to these crooked finance companies. Henry was a young man that had moved with his parents from Arkansas to make a fortune in the woods of California.
I can recall one time when Henry’s father came up short on chain binders on his logging truck. He had filed a certain brand into the metal, and when the two of them went searching and located the truck where these particular chain binders had strayed. Well Henry was not a happy camper, when he confronted the owner of this truck where the chain binders now reside. This man, swore up and down that the binders did in fact belong to him, arguing that someone else had filed these identifying brands or designs into the metal of his binders.
Well fellers when push came to shove, old Henry had the upper hand, and in that hand he held a short length of chain that he placed across the center of this mans skull dropping him promptly to the ground. This blow rendered him unconscious, and bleeding profusely. Henry then took all the branded chain binders off the offending truck, placed them in his pick-up loaded his father in the truck, and drove home never looking back. The outcome of this event was the man recovered but never pressed charges, and I doubt if he ever acquired any illegitimate equipment after this experience. We enjoyed several good rides together before I moved on to experience riders of a different kind. I found out many years later that Jack Montgomery became a large and sucessful logging contractor in Oregon. I believe that Henry Hammock made enough money logging in California to afford him a good life in retirement back home in Arkansas.
Just this past week I went to breakfast(does this sound like a pattern starting to develop breakfast?) with a new bunch of retired guy’s. This group of outlaws refer to themselves as the old farts club.
As usual the bull flowed freely at this get together, and the first liar didn’t stand a chance. It is kind of humorous to look around at this bunch of over the hill missfits ( myself included ) and listen to the many accomplishments that have resulted due to their talents, dedication and hard work. I have been so fortunate to have met such a wide variety of occupations and talented individuals in the course of my lifetime. I never have taken for granted the skills that other people have attained; instead I just appreciate and admire the end results of their labor.
I know I have wandered from the subject of trail riding; but during the course of some of our rides we would have to make repairs on our equipment in order to finish our trip. The old phrase necessity is the mother of invention unveiled its ugly head many times on some dusty trail in the back woods. The make-shift repairs in the woods, and the design and manufacture of a permanent repair at home in one of these fellows shop is where their talent really bloomed.
You get a group of men together and it will amaze you what can be developed and produced. Any-hoo back to the old farts club and some of it’s members, Paul Whitney to be precise. Paul is a retired butcher by trade, but that is only one of the hats that he wears. He is a fair salesman, decent mechanic, above average rider, and excellent in the art of needling people. He can really stir up a can of worms and agitate better than most. It was Paul that took a bunch of us on what he refered to as a Shirley Temple ride. This is his way of taking you on a fairly rough trail that you are not used to, and hoping to make you look silly. In my case that is exactly what happened.
I had just gotten a new Bultaco Sherpa T trials 250 cc motorcycle. My brother-inlaw John Cox was always trying to get me off my old BSA and into real trail riding on a real trail bike. So he convinced me it was to my advantage to trade bikes straight across, well this was financially a great deal for me, but as it turned out on my first ride it was not a good deal physically for me or my bike. I was not used to this new bike or comfortable with the trail we were taking, but super needle Whitney kept turning the screw until I relented. The result of my stupidity was a scratched and bruised body, plus a warped and bent motorcycle due to my lack of ability to negotiate this Shirley Temple trail. I tried putting my foot down on the low side of the hill, and there wasn’t any land under my foot. Consequently Okie and bike went sliding down the hill. Well not at first. At first we tumbled a few times, but this event only energized Whitney’s art of teasing. When he saw the fix I was in, I thought he would split a gut. He told Wes to take this candy ass back to Uncle Toms Cabin ( a small store out in the back woods ) and stay there until the real men finished their ride. Paul is also the kind of person that might shoot holes in your vehicle with his hand gun while you are out camping.
Now my best friend Wes had a different experience with starting down the trail of biking. His first ride was on my 55 BSA, when I was riding double with him on the back. After a while I ask if he would like to change places, he was a little reluctant at first but with a little pleading, he rode point and I rode drag. Boy what a mistake that was, as we were scooting along I said Wes why don’t you make a right turn on this road ahead. Well his immediate action was to turn the handle bars to the right instead of leaning the bike, the end result was me Wes and the bike in a ditch. Wes caught on quick enough that he wanted to purchase his own machine, and this is where the real trouble began. Any one that knows Wes also knows that it takes an act of congress to get him to make a decision. So the journey into motorcycle ownership for Wes was a long and grueling trip. We made trips to every shop in Sacramento many times comparing this machine against that machine.
The result of all these comparisons was the purchase of a 250 Parilla Wildcat Scrambler. This particular bike was truly Gods way of getting even with Wes for something terrible he must have done during his life. In the first place it was a racing bike designed for a quarter mile track, not to turn 10 grand on a paved highway. On more than one occasion Wes was screaming down the highway with that bikes engine turning much faster than its design and bang it would spit valves into the head and piston. Hall and Burdette the Parilla dealer in North Sacramento retired off the money they made from parts they sold to Wes to repair this evil machine. But poor old Wes was determined that he was going to break this bronco. This bronco had other ideas and in the end the Parilla came out on top.
After trying to make a street bike out of this racer, he decided to make it into an off the road hill-climbing scooter. After a few attempts at beating a trail to the top of the hill, old Wes succeeded in his challenge. Where his endeavor failed was after he reached the top he forgot to release the throttle and his quarter mile racer decided to become a tree climber. At the top of this hill was a tree and Wes hit that tree and then tried to climb it with his bike. Talk about having a warriors heart. Now you might think this is the end of this story, no way that bike is not through with Wes yet. The kick start on this bike had a downward slant in its casting causing your foot to slide off while cranking it over. This resulted in Wes slicing his right calf open almost to the bone more than once. Wes really loved that bike it just didn’t reciprocate.