The Boneshakers at the Bike Show
Written by Virgil Elliott
The Boneshakers entered Ray Fahrner’s motorcycle show in St. Louis in 1968 or ’69 with a display of our bikes. The show had several award categories, including Most Unusual Display, which I thought we could win easily. Whereas the typical entrant had a mirror under his bike, angel hair stuck in the exhaust bikes representing smoke, and maybe a pretty girl sitting on it, we had a more original idea. For our display, we put peat moss on the floor to simulate dirt as an outdoor party site, and empty beer, wine and whiskey bottles around the bikes, with a cooler with full bottles as well. To complete the display, we were there ourselves, partying. It was the most interesting part of the show, obviously.
There was a booth where a fellow calling himself Rotten Ron was selling posters of us that he had not asked our permission to print, which someone told me about, so I investigated. I visited Rotten Ron’s booth, and politely suggested that he should have asked us before getting those posters made. Despite how polite I was, Rotten Ron became terrified and turned the entire lot of posters over to me. We then placed them on sale at our display, to raise money to get Worm out of jail.
As the show went on, our display grew more and more interesting as we continued to drink and party in our typically rowdy, fun-loving way, and some of the guys autographed posters with lewd or antisocial scribings when asked for autographs. We were probably having more fun than some people thought should be allowed, but that was part of our display, which became even more authentic as a motorcycle club party when Uncle Ugly, drunk, puked all over himself and then passed out on the floor between two of our bikes. Apparently. Some of the show’s attendees apparently failed to appreciate or understand that this was all part of our bid for the Most Unusual Display award, as we were to learn when the award ceremony took place at the end of the show.
There was an elevated stage for the awards ceremony, with a local disc jockey, Lou Cooley, acting as Master of Ceremonies, and a pretty girl in a bathing suit and a banner around her designating her as Miss Bike Show, or something like that, whose job it was to hand each award winner his trophy and give him a kiss on the cheek. The Announcer made a speech, saying “Ninety-nine percent of the exhibitors were a credit to the show. The other one percent won’t be invited back next year (meaning us, of course.)
My bike had won Second Place, with First Place going to some dickhead whose bike was just a bolt-on chopper with no interesting hand-fabricated parts like mine had. His display was the usual mirror-under-the-bike with angel hair stuck in the exhaust pipes; how imaginative. I didn’t appreciate taking Second to a bike that had no more innovativeness to it than that. So when my name was called to go get my trophy, I sent Uncle Ugly, who had regained consciousness by then and looked like hell, puffy-eyed with puke in his beard and all over his monster shirt and filthy Levis, his long-handle mustache sticking out at odd angles, to go get my trophy. Unk, a natural showman who was built like a gorilla, ascended the stairs to the stage, grabbed Miss Bike Show by the neck when she wasn’t looking, gave a wicked cackle as he turned his head to look at the crowd, and then gave Miss Bike Show his tongue in a French kiss as the crowd roared with laughter. The announcer, dumbfounded, began stammering into the microphone, “OhmyGod, OmyGod, I know how it must feel to be kissed by one of those things, OmyGod…” to which I yelled, “How do you know?” and the crowd roared even more. It was pandemonium.
Despite all this, the Boneshakers did not win the Most Unusual Display Award.
As a footnote, Ray Fahrner did invite us back the next year, because we were what made the show interesting.