It's likely many are unaware of the history of Hollister, a small town out in the boondocks of central California. Inland from Monterey and south of San Jose and the Bay area, in 1947 Hollister was the location of the now famous “riot” that served as the basis for the Marlon Brando film “The Wild Bunch.” By popular myth, it is also viewed as the birth of the American biker culture.
The bikers were World War II vets, who joined in various clubs, or "gangs," as the press called them. The American Motorcycle Association sanctioned a Gypsy Tour motorcycle rally in Hollister that weekend in 1947. While reports differ widely, it is generally agreed that many more bikers showed up than were expected, with folks coming from all over. Some reports indicate a few guys got out of hand, though the press wildly exaggerated the situation.
Though the bikers roared their bikes up and down the town’s roads and drank in all of the welcoming bars, various sources indicated later that it wasn’t as bad as made out to be by the press after the fact. For good or bad, however, the legend of the Hollister riot had begun. Inarguable, however, was the fact that the American biker image had begun to take shape and the foundation for the biker life style had been laid. The Hollister Rally has been taking place over on and off over July 4th for a number of years.
And the term “1%’ers” actually has its origins in the American Motorcycle Association (AMA) sanctioned Gypsy Tour motorcycle rally in Hollister that weekend in 1947. As discussed earlier, there was a so-called riot that received plenty of bad press. To counter the bad press, the AMA published an article declaring 99% of its members are law abiding and only 1% were the outlaws who created the problems. In protest, some of the groups cut their patches into three pieces, which now have great significance in the biker world. Thus began the definition of the one percenters. It has become synonymous with outlaw. Other, more conventional biker clubs use one-piece patches, which usually identify a riding club, AMA sanctioned club, political action, or biker rights club.
I did a bit of research and found the LA Times carried a story estimating 60,000 bikers enjoyed the three days of the last Hollister we attended.
60,000 bikes at an average cost of $20,000 each equals $1,200,000,000. Over a billion dollars, just in bikes alone. What an impressive display of American consumers in action. Impressive by any measure. And it isn’t the largest motorcycle rally. During the same research, I checked out Sturgis 2010, also known as the Black Hills Motorcycle Rally, which we attended. According to Motorcycleusa.com, Rally Director Brenda Vasknetz estimated 600,000 people attended Sturgis in 2010. There are far more couples at Sturgis than at Hollister, so I needed to come up with a way to approximate the number of bikes. For general purpose and based on personal observations, I assumed 85% of the bikers were solo, leaving 15% having a passenger. Based on these estimates, that works out to 555,000 bikes. Using the same figure from above, 555,000 bikes at an average of $20,000 per bike means there was over eleven billion dollars worth of bikes at Sturgis in 2010. Now that is really impressive!
Wonder how many bikes will be heading to Hollister this year? We will be there and look forward to the rally. Hope to see fellow veterans and Marines walking and riding the streets.
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