This illustrated guide is packed with interesting facts and follows the history of the famous Harley-Davidson company and the developmentof its famous bikes, which have earned a special place in the hearts of enthusiasts everywhere. The story dates from 1903 when Bill Harley andthe Davidson brothers, with no thought of fame or fortune, decided to build a motorcycle that really worked. So successful was it, that it led to the gradual formation of a company that has survived through good times and bad. Building on the Founder's original idea of producing reliable and sturdy bikes, Harley-Davidson initially resisted racing, but was eventually faced with competition from outside the United States, which left it no alternative but to join the fray. Through good times and bad, losing and winning back police contracts, as well as weathering various other vicissitudes, the company has achieved lasting success. In the end, Harley-Davidson came to the ultimate decision of giving its customers what they really wanted, not by providing year-on-year innovations, but by remaining true to the Founders' original concept. The result, as everyone knows, are bikes of mythic status, imbued with a mysterious quality of their own and generating a passion in enthusiasts amounting almost to a love affair. The name has come to personify America and is up there alongside Coca-Cola, Ford and McDonald's. The bikes are described in detail, not only in mechanical terms, but also with glorious photographs, and will be of interest to everyone who loves motorbikes: even aficionados of Japanese and European bikes, who have never even ridden an Harley-Davidson, will be able to recognize the unique marriage of style and nostalgia and the fact that there are no other bikes quite like them.

A freewheeling essay on mortality and freedom at the intersection of ancient philosophy and biker culture After my accident, I thought I was done with bikes. Until a few years ago—I was lying in bed having trouble sleeping when I heard a voice say to me, “Alan, get a Harley and ride to Death Valley.

For his eighth birthday, Emilio Scotto received a World Atlas. Promptly he announced his plan to make a route that would pass through all the countries of the world, a route he named BLUE ROAD ONE. When, some years later, he found himself astride a black 1100 Honda Gold Wing motorcycle, Blue Road One beckoned, and Scotto set off on a journey that would last more than a decade, take him virtually everywhere in the world, and land him in the Guinness Book of World Records. This is his story, a thrill ride that begins in his native Argentina, crosses Panama in the tumultuous time of Noriega, Mexico in the midst of an earthquake, and finds him broke in L.A. where, in a chance meeting, Muhammad Ali gives him fifty dollars and a signed book. Breaching the Iron Curtain, crossing the Berlin Wall at Checkpoint Charlie, being blessed by the Pope, set upon by cannibals in Sierra Leone, fleeing Somalia on a freighter, Scotto’s adventures would be unbelievable if they weren’t true. His tale of touring the world from Tunisia to Turkey, Petra to Afghanistan, Yugoslavia to Singapore, traveling miles enough to take him to the moon and back, is unlike any ever told. Come along, for the ride of a lifetime.

One thing I can say with certainty is that I have not had a dull life. I have been shot twice, stabbed, blown up, bitten by a rattlesnake and by a scorpion, plus had numerous car and motorcycle accidents...I've even been married twice. Here is the true-life story of Richard "Deadeye" Hayes in all its bad-ass, balls-to-the-wall glory. This is a man who stole a machine gun before he was seven and lost his left eye when a good friend shot him in the face. As a member--and then president--of the infamous Los Valientes Motorcycle Club, he broke more laws and had more fun than any six of the coolest guys you know. Butch told me the club had a hard time deciding whether to vote me in or kill me.I always hoped he was kidding. One of the last true Outlaw Bikers, Deadeye knows what it means to be a man, take shit from no one, and have tattoos that actually say something. Riding, drug dealing, and sending men to the hospital with his bare hands, Deadeye made himself a legend among bikers--all the while making sure his daughters never got mixed up with guys like him. I've always been of the belief that bikers are born, not made. Real bikers, that is. We must have an extra gene or something that gives us this I'll-live-like-I-want-whether-you-approve-of-it-or-not-and-fuck-your-rules attitude. In his own words, Deadeye tells it all. From earning his colors with an outlaw motorcycle club to his steady diet of drugs, sex, violence, and crime, this is his story: true to life, yet larger than life, and full throttle all the way. Richard "Deadeye" Hayes grew up in St. Paul, Minnesota, and learned at an early age that the confines of school and authority bored him. To alleviate this minor problem, he created much larger ones such as bar fights, gunfights, knife fights, fistfights, drugs, drug dealers, drug dealing, and dealing in stolen goods. It is an understatement to say that Deadeye enjoys adventure and values a sense of humor. He currently serves as president of the Los Valientes Motorcycle Club. He lives in South St. Paul, Minnesota. Mary Gardner is the author of Salvation Run, Boat People, and two other novels. A former Woodrow Wilson Fellow with a master's degree in English from the University of Chicago, she teaches at the Loft, a community writing center in Minneapolis. Her shorter work has been published in The New York Times, Minneapolis Star-Tribune, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, andFriends Journal. In the winter she lives in St. Paul; she spends summers in her cabin in northwestern Minnesota. "Colorful, fast-paced and fun." --Kirkus Reviews "Surely Deadeye Hayes has defied all actuarial tables to live long enough to writeOutlaw Biker. I read an advance copy of this memoir at full throttle with fascination equal to passing an especially grisly wreck on the highway. The writing possesses sureness, authenticity, and maybe even a touch of poetry. If you have a rebellious teenage daughter, don't read this book any time soon. This may just be the best book ever written by an author who's been shot twice, stabbed once, and bitten by a rattlesnake!" --Geoffrey Leavenworth, author ofIsle of Misfortune

A collection of fourteen lively essays draws on their writers' beliefs about the compatibility of biking and living a philosophical lifestyle, explaining how the act of riding promotes a practice of living in a contemplative present and honing the senses. Original.

"California, Labor Day weekend . . . early, with ocean fog still in the streets, outlaw motorcyclists wearing chains, shades and greasy Levis roll out from damp garages, all-night diners and cast-off one-night pads in Frisco, Hollywood, Berdoo and East Oakland, heading for the Monterey peninsula, north of Big Sur. . . The Menace is loose again." Thus begins Hunter S. Thompson's vivid account of his experiences with California's most no-torious motorcycle gang, the Hell's Angels. In the mid-1960s, Thompson spent almost two years living with the controversial An-gels, cycling up and down the coast, reveling in the anarchic spirit of their clan, and, as befits their name, raising hell. His book successfully captures a singular moment in American history, when the biker lifestyle was first defined, and when such countercultural movements were electrifying and horrifying America. Thompson, the creator of Gonzo journalism, writes with his usual bravado, energy, and brutal honesty, and with a nuanced and incisive eye; as The New Yorker pointed out, "For all its uninhibited and sardonic humor, Thompson's book is a thoughtful piece of work." As illuminating now as when originally published in 1967, Hell's Angels is a gripping portrait, and the best account we have of the truth behind an American legend. From the Hardcover edition.

Ask just about any motorcycle fan, and they’ll tell you that Harley-Davidson builds the ultimate motorcycle. And the motorcycles housed in Harley-Davidson’s Archive Collection represent the best of the best. Harley-Davidson Archive Collection: Road Bikes tells the story of this amazing company through the incredible motorcycles it builds, selected from the hundreds of motorcycles in the Archive Collection. Portrait-quality photography of the book taken by expert lenseman Randy Leffingwell reveals the remarkable journey of America’s motorcycle company, from its humble beginnings to its nearly century-long dominance of an entire industry.