The following article came from the typewriter of pioneer motorcycle racer William Wells Bennett, a Kansas native who became a legend in the saddle over a rare three-decade career. In his own words, Wells looked back on how he first got involved in motorcycle racing, providing the mini autobiography for an Excelsior sales brochure in 1920, the company where he spent most of his career.
By 1920, he had become a key figure in American motorcycle racing, having conquered every venue from dirt ovals and board track motordromes to GP road courses and near-vertical hill climbs. As he wrote his article for Excelsior, Wells was transitioning into long-distance racing, city-to-city flag runs, record-setting endurance feats, and alcohol-fueled hillclimbing. He soon opened his own Excelsior-Henderson dealership in Portland, which he ran until the company shuttered its doors in 1931, and he spent the rest of his life as a service representative for the Ford Motor Company.
Wells Bennett is one of the few pioneer motorcycle racers to survive the deadly motordrome era and build a long, highly successful career in racing. After reading the new story, check out past articles on the legendary Wells Bennett, Wells Bennett at Mt. Hood, The Grind of a Speeding Phantom, and the Wells Bennett Archive Icon biography, exclusively at Archive Moto.
Pioneer American motorcycle racer Arthur Joseph Mitchel Jr. was a tenacious sportsman at the turn of the 20th century whose fearlessness and resilience had earned him the nickname “The Bulldog” even before the first board track went up. A native of New Orleans, Louisiana, Mitchel was born April 19, 1881, and began racing bicycles as a teenager in the late 1890s, joining the ranks of professional cyclists by the first years of the new century. Like so many of his generation, he found himself at the crossroads between pedals and engines when America’s cycling craze gave birth to the motorcycle, first cutting his teeth on the motorized pacing machines that had begun to captivate the cycling crowd.
When this brief autobiography of Joe Wolters appeared in the spring of 1920, the racing season had already begun under tragic circumstances for Wolters and the Excelsior factory team. On January 2, teammate Bob Perry was killed while running at full clip during qualifying at Los Angeles’ Ascot Park for the upcoming 100-Mile National, crashing aboard the formidable overhead-cam Excelsior he had helped develop.
For Wolters, Perry’s accident came late in a career that had already spanned nearly the entire history of American motorcycle racing, Wolters himself having survived multiple crashes that could have easily ended the same as Perry’s, and though he was back in the saddle one week later, retirement was drawing closer to focus. “Farmer Joe,” as he was known, was one of the sport’s founding fathers; prolific, decorated and profoundly influential during an era when motorcycle competition evolved from improvised local contests to the sensational board track motordromes, massive wooden speedways and increasingly sophisticated factory racing programs.
One hundred and ten years ago, in 1916, as America celebrated its 140th Anniversary, Harley-Davidson was busy building momentum as one of the world’s best motorcycle brands. Leading the charge was the Bar and Shield’s first racing star, Leslie “Red” Parkhurst, who spent the day sending shivers through the grandstands in Brooklyn, New York, with his blistering speed. Running one of Harley-Davidson’s first overhead-valve factory racing machines, Parkhurst thrilled the crowd of 18,000 at speeds well in excess of 90 mph at the massive 2-mile-long board track super speedway at Sheepshead Bay. His efforts earned him both the 2-mile FAM National Championship and the title in the 100-mile race and set a new 50-mile record.
