Imagine buying a home and finding out it once belonged to a legend. A larger-than-life character with a bio that reads like a collection of tall tales. When we heard the current owner of Cannon Ball Baker’s house wanted to raise money for a historical marker, Corey made a beeline down to Cannon Ball Brewing Co. in Indianapolis for their fundraising event.
“That’s entertainment,” I heard someone say. The crowd cheered, peering down into the Wall of Death, a worn wooden motordrome with nicks and scars. The American Motor Drome Company clearly has this nostalgic stunt show dialed in as “America’s original extreme motorcycle show.”
Imagine tearing around a board track speedway in this little gem. Back in 2004, this 750cc beastie was found in Livermore, California. We received a heads-up via email from Dennis Suter at Vintage Flat Trackers that this was for sale, ahem, for $75,000. The email says that these cars were raced on half-mile and mile tracks from Long Beach to Portland.
Tony Prust’s northern Chicago shop, Analog Motorcycles, has maintained a solid and steady presence in the custom motorcycle realm and garners much attention on the web. We wanted to share his latest build, the Continental Scout featured on BikeEXIF, but dig a little deeper into the mind behind the machine.
We didn’t know much about the annual show n’ swap in Wauseon, Ohio, but we’d heard enough good stuff about it to give it a shot. Turns out, it’s stellar. It’s big. And it was chock-full of motorcycle Americana and a sprinkling of other makes, models and memorabilia. Here, let us give you a photo tour…
In the early to mid 1930s, a British gal named Ellen rose to fame as a Wall of Death performer. She was a cashier for Billy Butlin’s amusement park in Skegness when she asked if she could try riding a motorcycle around the new and highly dangerous motordrome. This marked her transformation to “Dare Devil Alma.”
