Heroes of Harley's Century

HEROES OF HARLEY'S CENTURY

HARLEY-Davidson’s 100th birthday party pretty much spans 2003 with events worldwide, but the core of the celebration—where it’s easiest to understand how and why H-D still makes motorcycles after all these years and where it simply feels right to sing while they blow out the candles—is a show called the “Heroes of Harley-Davidson.” This is serendipity at its best. The show is this year’s presentation of the AMA’s Motorcycle Hall of Fame at the club’s head-quarter’s in Pickerington, Ohio, working in partnership with H-D. Harley’s

founders were historically aware early on, so The Motor Company has tremendous depth to its archives, while the museum has professional staff members as well as access to American, even world, collectors.

The combination presents a show as wide, deep, accurate and personal as any HarleyDavidson display has ever been.

It’s all there, all the historic machines, the riders, tuners, builders. The curators reckoned there are 22 facets to the Harley century, so there are 22 sections, each a show in itself. Just to cite one, it’s been easy to doubt the myth that the carburetor for the H-D prototype began life as a tomato soup can, but inspection of the replica of the company’s first shop, a backyard shed equipped with what passed for machine tools in 1903, makes using what you’ve got a more sensible, thus believable, proposition.

And we haven’t even touched on the racing, touring, racial and gender diversity, adventures on foreign shores, or even the risk dad and granddad will go on and on about I Had One Of Those.

Allan Girdler