- Welcome again to the Community Lecture series
of the College of Letters and Science.
Tonight's speaker is Lisa Theo.
Lisa is a Geography instructor
and the Coordinator of Undergraduate Research
at the University of Wisconsin- Stevens Point.
She and her husband, Cristos,
have been married for 30 years
and they have three adult sons.
While the children were young she returned
to school earning her Bachelor's of Science
in Geography at UW-Eau Claire
and her Masters of Science
in Geography at UW-Madison.
She was the first person in her family
to earn a college degree.
That makes you a first-generation college student.
Lisa has held a number of public service positions
and started two home businesses
during her more than 35 years in the workforce.
She's managed women's clothing stores,
served as a legislative aide to a State Senator,
worked in food service, run a home-child care business
and had a home business designing
and constructing original wedding gowns
and bridal accessories.
She's taught at the university since 1999,
first at UW-Madison as a graduate student
and then at UW-Eau Claire,
before joining the Geography and Geology appointment
department here at UWSP in 2007.
Which was two years before I got here
and I can thank Lisa personally
because she was on the search committee
for my Dean's selection.
During her teaching career Lisa served
as a task member of the Lieutenant Governor
Barbara Lawton's Wisconsin
Women Equal Opportunity Initiative
where she was responsible
for spatial analysis and cartography.
She also served as Eau Claire's representative
to the Wisconsin Economic Summit from 2001 to 2003,
coordinating a session on university
and community partnerships
for economic development in 2003.
Lisa's research as a university instructor
concentrates on community change
in Wisconsin's Northwoods
and conflicts at the urban-rural fringe.
I'd like to welcome Lisa Theo
and Creation of Community
at Tomahawk's Harley-Davidson Fall Ride.
Lisa?
(audience applause)
- Thanks all, I appreciate that warm welcome
and thank you Chris.
I have been going to the Fall Ride
since I can remember as a young child
visiting up there.
We didn't go to all the events at the Fall Ride
because a lot of them are more adult in nature.
But my favorite one is, the part of the weekend
is the Thunder Parade,
which those of you that were here early,
you saw some of that in the video
that we were showing earlier.
Some years, if the weather's bad
it could be maybe a hundred bikes.
If the weather's good and warm,
thousands of bikes that take off
from the Tomahawk Schools complex
and go on about a 17 to 18 mile trek
near Tomahawk and end up in downtown Tomahawk
lining up their bikes up and down the street.
And it's loud and wonderful and crazy
and just a lot of fun.
And if there's
one thing you can do to enjoy the Fall Ride
I'd say that's the one thing you need to do
is go see that Thunder Parade sometime in your life.
So my nickname for this talk
is Brigadoon on Wheels.
For those of you that are not familiar
with Brigadoon, Brigadoon is that mythical village
in Scotland that appears once every hundred years
for a day and then disappears
to be brought back in a hundred years.
And okay, maybe it isn't a hundred years difference,
but what I'm going to be talking about is how
Tomahawk during this week or weekend,
long weekend of the Fall Ride,
creates this brand new community almost overnight.
And at the end of the weekend it dissipates
to come back the next year.
It's beautiful, I urge you all to try it.
Well this is, there we go.
Now to orient yourself Tomahawk,
in case you're not familiar with it
is about 70 miles north of here on Highway 51.
Right here okay, so we're right down there.
It's about, well here's Tomahawk the city here.
And over, about 20 miles to the east
would be Rhinelander.
About 70 miles to the west is Ladysmith.
Many people know about Minocqua
because of the tourist community up there,
that's up this way about 20 some, 25 miles from Tomahawk.
Just so you can orient, it's a Geography professor thing.
You have to have some maps, alright.
There's a long, long history of Tomahawk
and Harley-Davidson working together,
creating community in this wonderful city
of Tomahawk in our Northwoods.
Harley-Davidson is the community's second largest employer.
They have been in Tomahawk
since 1963 when--
I'm gonna read it so I make sure
I get the data right on this one.
The local lore is that Willie Davidson
who was the grandson of the founder,
was a regular visitor to the region.
And in February of '62
Harley-Davidson purchased a controlling interest
in the Tomahawk boat manufacturing company,
which was making fiberglass boats.
And the connection to the Harleys
with the fiberglass was just perfect.
So they bought a controlling interest.
Within a year, the Tomahawk boat company
was no longer making boats,
everything was Harley-Davidson.
In the early 2000's Tomahawk had three
different Harley-Davidson plants
within the city, the city area.
Many, many people employed there.
As a community partner Harley has done
some wonderful, wonderful things for the community.
According to an August 22, 2010 article
in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, quote
"Harley-Davidson and it's employees
have made Tomahawk a better place to live.
Through donations and fund raisers
they have done things such as replace
the floor in a school gymnasium,
build walking trails, assist the public library
and renovate community center bathrooms.
The plants have hosted high school
and college students in work cooperative programs.
They have been a place where you can graduate
from high school and have a career
that lasts a lifetime," unquote.
The article continues quoting Mike Messinger,
owner of Lincoln County Cycles,
a Tomahawk motorcycle shop.
Harley-Davidson quote "Is hugely important.
Our largest employer in the city is the paper mill,
but you don't see people
with paper mill tattoos on their arms,"
(audience laughs) unquote.
So, sense of community.
What does that mean?
It's really a long-studied concept
that we see in social psychology, anthropology,
urban planning, public administration
and many other disciplines.
They are varying but always fairly similar definitions
of what this means.
And most of them focus on the idea of membership,
the idea that you belong.
It's a place that there's in and out.
You are either in the group or you are not.
There can be a real sense of,
let's say emotional safety
in knowing that you're part of that group,
strength in numbers, perhaps.
And maybe there's a common symbol that helps you
connect to this idea of membership,
Harley-Davidson logo, perhaps
or the Harley Owner Groups, HOGS.
Whatever logos they have for their individual groups.
Even just the leather alone could be one of those symbols
when we're thinking about Harley-Davidson.
An integration in fulfillment of needs.
There's a reward for being part of this community.
Whether it's the emotional feedback,
that sense of community or the reward of,
knowing you belong.
You know that you're part of something bigger than you are.
Shared emotional connection also that collective history
that we know we're part of this culture
and this is an important culture.
McMillan and Chavis in 1986
defined sense of community as quote,
"A feeling that members have of belonging,
a feeling that members matter to one another
and to the group, and a shared faith
that member's needs will be met through
their commitment to be together," unquote.
So we're going to look at this sense of community
in Tomahawk during this Harley-Davidson Fall Ride
and how this has kind of changed over time.
Initially it started out with 21 bikers
just going to see the leaves, okay.
They had it as a little fund raiser,
each person put in a little bit of money
and they donated to a local charity.
21, in early October, great time to be up North
to see the leaves, some years.
(audience laughs)
Some years it could be snow, like we know.
Some years it could be 85 degrees, right?
They found over the next couple years
that it's probably a better idea
to move it up a little bit.
In 1983 the next year they had 160 people participate,
word had spread.
1983 is when the idea of the Harley Owners Groups
started coming into being, too.
So it's the first time you hear
that HOG acronym for the groups.
They decided to focus on donating the money
that they raised in the registration fees,
to the Muscular Dystrophy Association
and it has been that way ever since
that every fund raising event for it
is going to the Muscular Dystrophy Association.
A big $350 that year.
I'm skipping some years in between here
just to get to the key ones.
Again for the weather they fell into a couple years
where the attendance wasn't great because of the weather.
Moved it up to September in hopes that
that would help.
But we also know that September in the Northwoods
can be almost as iffy as October,
so there's good and bad years with that, as well.
1986, 1200 people and raised $3200 for MDA,
and they're off for the most part.
1989, 5,000 people, $10,000 to MDA.
In 1990, Bob Troutman,
his nickname is Bubba decided,
"You know this is getting big enough,
the city of Tomahawk can't really hold
all of this downtown.
It's a community of less than 35 hundred people.
And there's enough of this fun to go around."
So he rents out the Tomahawk Speedway
and holds concerts and free camping
to people that will pay the concert entrance fee.
And to orient yourself here, this is Tomahawk.
This main street area where the party would be,
would be down here in Sara Park, which is right
on Lake Mohawksin here on the Wisconsin River.
Tomahawk Speedway is up a few miles north of town.
That was nice for some of the locals
who didn't care for all the noise, ya know.
That was kinda outside the city limits for awhile.
It got to be a big, big event out there,
big acts coming in, big major rock and roll.
Look I show my age here, rock and roll acts
coming in for that and it became quite successful
to come out there.
And people would go to both places.
They'd go downtown or they'd also go out
to the Tomahawk Speedway.
So coinciding in 1990 with Bubba having
this second venue out on the north side
is the first time they decided to have a raffle.
And now by this time Harley-Davidson
is cooperating with the festival.
They're working together to do this fundraising
for the Muscular Dystrophy Association,
and they're donating a brand new Harley-Davidson.
The next year the revenues just sky rocket
because of that raffle.
In 1991 the very first Thunder Parade,
like I said they didn't call it Thunder Parade
at the time I believe they called
it the Light Brigade Parade.
They shut down all the lights on Main Street,
so as the bikes came down Main Street
it was just the lights of the bikes which was quite neat.
They raised $20,000 for the Muscular Dystrophy Association.
The Zor Shrine Temple Precision Motorcycle Team
came up to lead the parade.
And they're doing outreach to the community.
This isn't just for the bikers
that are coming in for the party.
The local nursing homes had visits from the Zor Shriners.
They gave free T-shirts to nursing home residents
to kind of rally the troops in the whole community
around this idea of the Fall Ride.
I'd like to share something here with you
from the Tomahawk Leader newspaper
dated September 20th, 1994.
"Some riders traveled as far away as Pennsylvania
and even Alaska to spend the weekend in Tomahawk.
Augie and Sherry Minsloff, members of the
Anchorage, Alaska chapter of the Harley Owners Group
made their first pilgrimage to Colorama this year."
That was the nickname they had for the event.
"They said it certainly won't be their last either."
Quote, 'We've been hearing about it for so long,
said Augie, we had to come down and do it.
We'll definitely be coming back.'
After shipping their two Harley-Davidsons
from Anchorage to Seattle, the Minsloffs
rejoined their bikes and rode the 25 hundred miles
from Seattle to Tomahawk.
They were accompanied at Colorama
by Augie's brother, Jarn and his wife Judy
who live in Wisconsin.
Jarn worked for Harley-Davidson in Milwaukee
for 25 years and has been attending Colorama
for the last nine years.
It was he who finally persuaded his brother
to make the journey to Tomahawk.
Quote, 'In the nine years I've been coming up here,
it keeps getting better and better,' said Jarn,
'The camaraderie in everything is just great.'
Jarn also credits the hospitality of the Tomahawk
community for making bikers feel welcome
in town every year.
Jarn and Judy Minsloff, like most Colorama regulars
had the weekend's accommodations booked
at least a year in advance.
In fact they have a standing reservation
at the Pine Cone Resort."
And that's something that, you know,
that's in the early '90s that continues to this day.
There are people that have been staying
at the same places for over 20 years.
Because in a community of only 3,400 or 3,500 people,
there aren't a lot of hotel spaces.
There are resorts on some of the lakes,
but if you not bringing up a camper or tent,
you might be going as far away as 90 miles
to find a hotel to be able to accommodate
the growing throngs that are coming for this now.
By 1995, because of those throngs of people
the Chamber of Commerce is asking community members
if they'll open up their homes.
'Cause so many people are coming up
and there just isn't enough space for everybody.
There are people that I've talked to
that didn't want their names on here
that weren't all that thrilled with the noise
and the hassle and the hubbub of the week.
But they've started renting out their homes
and the money they make over the course
of that week pays for their vacation somewhere
very nice for that week.
And everybody goes away happy.
The Chamber of Commerce has mentioned that
that's been quite successful.
So that's kind of neat.
So in 1995, 13,000 people,
$80,000 to MDA.
You can see how that raffling
of the motorcycle has really increased
the amount of money that they give to MDA.
1997, this is kind of stagnating
at about 30,000 people, okay?
And right around $100,000 for MDA.
This is the year after the Packers
won the Super Bowl, so they had a specially
designed Green Bay Packer Harley-Davidson
that Harley aficionado Mike Holmgren signed
and that was what the raffle drawing
was for that year.
So that really amp-ed up the fund raising that year.
This is also the first year of the Street Dance.
Now the Street Dance, oops I thought
I had the map there for that,
that must be coming up next.
The Street Dance is...
where they block off four blocks
on what they nicknamed Main Street,
it's really Wisconsin Avenue.
And it's closed to only motorcycle traffic
and then even no motorcycle traffic in the evenings.
And they have bands at either end of the street, okay.
And it's just nothing but closed off party
for the whole evening, both evenings of the weekend.
Quite successful that first year
and it still continues to this day.
In 1998, they have more non-bike activities added.
And this is for the locals.
Because for the most part those that are coming in
on a bike are not bringing their families.
You know, it's one or two people on a bike
so if we're having family activities
it's for the locals.
So they're doing a lot of things to make sure
the community feels connected
to what is going on with the Fall Ride.
Share again from the Tomahawk Leader
an article, September 15, 1998
by the columnist Mark Gerke.
"Okay Harley riders I'm on to you.
You may fool some of the people some of the time,
but I know what you're up to
with your Born to Raise Hell jackets,
your bandannas and your women wearing
those skin tight leather accessories.
Every year you come roaring into our little town
looking for all the world like Hell's Angels.
But I know who you really are.
You're teachers, your accountants,
your business people, good people.
And your having fun because
for just a few days every September, you're free.
For those few days the traffic will be tighter
here and some of the locals might grumble a bit;
however, the more enlightened among us
will remember that you're here for a good cause.
Of course you're also here do some serious riding
in our beautiful Northwoods.
You might even tour the local plants
and see how we've grown.
We're mighty proud of
our Harley-Davidson plants here in Tomahawk.
You'll probably spend some time
checking out each other's bikes
and make note of the latest looks and features.
Above all, you'll probably hope
for warm days and nights.
Although in September in Northern Wisconsin
you just never know.
Harley riders I hope you have a great weekend.
Please be careful out there
and thank you for the great work you do
in raising money to fight Muscular Dystrophy.
You're good people doing good work for others
and having fun all the while.
I told you I was on to you."
So the community really understands that
this is a positive thing for everyone involved.
Another short article from the Tomahawk Leader,
Tuesday, September 12th in 2000.
"The Tomahawk Fall Ride brings in motorcycle enthusiasts
from all over the United States
and even some from other countries, as well.
The vast majority of those who come here
for the event seem to make it a yearly ritual.
Although the answer may seem obvious,
we here at the Tomahawk Leader
are curious to hear from riders
who make lengthy treks to be part
of the Fall Ride in Tomahawk.
We put out a call via our Internet web page
seeking comments on the Fall Ride
from those who come from further away.
We received a response from Patty and Bruce Blum
of Minnesota, which pretty much summed up
what we had suspected was the draw of the Tomahawk area.
The Blums wrote, quote 'The reason we continue
to make Tomahawk a yearly event is the small town
atmosphere we feel while visiting there.
Everyone has always been so nice
and there are such great rides to take in.
We camp at the Outpost Campground on Lake Nokomis
and meet up with some folks
from the Green Bay area.
From the poker runs to the parade
it is all well planned.
The Street Dance is great fun as well as the raffles.
Hoping for great weather again
and continued good times in the Tomahawk area,' unquote.
We join the Blums in congratulating
and saluting those who efforts have made
the Tomahawk Fall Ride such a tremendous success.
Any interesting ploy can get people to come once,
but to keep them coming back year after year
takes a solid well-run event
and the support of an entire community.
Tomahawk has both."
So in 2001, the Thunder Parade dedicates
the new Highway 51 bypass.
Now for anyone here that might remember
when the bypasses went through Stevens Point,
not through, around Stevens Point
and around Merrill around Mosinee,
it was a big deal for the local businesses.
I remember as a child growing up in Tomahawk
and when we wanted to head north
to visit all the family in Tomahawk,
from Fond du Lac.
Did I say that right that I was in Fond du Lac?
I lost track, no?
I grew up in Fond du Lac we'd go up north to Tomahawk.
My father was from there and that's kind of
where I feel is home to me.
But when we'd be going up, you know we'd
be stopping at Stevens Point,
'cause that's about half way.
Big King or Big Chef, is that right?
- [Audience Member] Burger Chef.
- Burger Chef!
But the Big Chef was kind of like
the McDonald's, ohhh.
We got that once a year, that's it, right?
You know, and boy, was that a treat.
And we'd always stop there, always stopped there
because it was about the half way point.
But you know traveling before the Highway 51 bypass
you were going through all the small towns.
So our next stop after Stevens Point
was going through Lake DuBay, you know.
And then up through Mosinee
and skirting passed Wausau a little bit.
You went downtown a little bit
yeah, but then you saw all these communities
and if you stopped to eat in the community.
When these bypasses went in a lot of communities
lost their small businesses.
It's quite a shame so when this happened
with the bypass was completed in Tomahawk,
it was tough for them, too.
Now some businesses thrive during things like this usually.
It's the hotels and the gas stations and the things,
fast food places that tend to be near highways
in their changes.
The local communities can really suffer.
So this was a challenge.
It was a challenge to Tomahawk
a challenge to many communities is,
"How do we continue to get people
to come inside when a bypass is built."
The Thunder Parade, they were
the very first people to drive on the bypass.
Now they had hoped to have it done in time
for the kick off of the Fall Ride that year.
It was actually delayed but it was finished enough
that they could ride it.
They had to do some painting and marking
and things like that and putting up some signs.
But they kind of inaugurated the bypass that year.
One more here to share from the Tomahawk Leader,
September 24th, 2002.
This is a list of just some testimonials.
The event had just finished up
like a week and a half or two weeks earlier.
"I just wanted to say how impressed my wife and I
were with this year's Fall Ride.
This was our first time attending
an event like this and we will be back.
We were told of this about two weeks
before the Ride weekend by some friends
we have just met in our area,
and asked us to come along with them.
They have been coming up there
for a few years now.
I can't tell you enough how much fun we had.
With an event of that size, you would expect trouble.
But we didn't see any really.
Even with all the drinking that was going on
everyone seemed to be under control.
Again we would like to thank the people
of Tomahawk for their fine hospitality
and we will see you again next year."
That's Ron and Sandy Schmitt from Mayville, Wisconsin.
"Hi, on my way out of Sara Park I saw a sign
that said, 'See pictures of yourself.
Tomahawk Leader dot com.'
So after I got home I'd thought I'd check.
You have a great website for a small paper,
I was very impressed.
I'd like to say that the parade was great.
Nice and long to minimize the bunching up,
yet short enough to keep everyone together.
And having people come out everywhere along
the route was great."
Brian Schonberg from Eagan, Minnesota.
People love the welcoming atmosphere
at the Tomahawk Fall Ride.
And it really is something special.
2003 was the Harley-Davidson 100th Anniversary
and people were concerned in Tomahawk
that perhaps all the riders were gonna
just wait and go down to Milwaukee.
And they weren't gonna see the crowds up in Tomahawk.
They were prepared for it
but they weren't really anticipating a big event.
But it ended up just as big as previous years,
30,000 attendees, raised almost $120,000 for MDA.
This is the first year that the Tomahawk Lions Club
sponsors rides for visually impaired people.
So the front of the parade is Harley riders
that are offering people a free ride
if they have visual impairments.
And they've continued it to this day.
It's a wonderful, wonderful way
to reach out again to the locals
and make that connection.
County decided to add some turning lanes
at Highway A which is the highway near Bubba's
big party, where's he's having
this alternate thing outside
of the downtown area.
Which was good, because of this growing number
of attendees you can imagine
on the little county highways how easily
we can have accidents and challenges
at least with that.
Bubba did help pay for some of that.
I think it was 10 or 15 thousand dollars
that he helped to pay for a turning lane
and a slow traffic lane near the Tomahawk Speedway.
Then 2005, the city adds a Postal Cancellation.
That not only shows the local pride in this event
but now we're talking about global outreach.
Because wherever that mail is going
you're seeing this Harley Fall Ride event.
It's now the 24th Annual Fall Ride
and 15 years of Bubba having this other party.
So this has become a huge event and people
are coming from all over the world.
It's gotten so big, well a part of is
the Tomahawk Speedway changed owners.
This seemed to be an opportunity
for Bubba to look for a bigger location
and something he'd have more control over
as far as the money and the income
and what he could do with it.
And he found a large plot of land north
of Lake Nokomis where there's over
two thou-- or 200 acres that he could use
for the party and for camping
and I've got some photos coming up to show you there.
And darn good thing he moved up there that year
to have additional room,
45,000 attendees
in a community of just under,
at this time, 33 hundred people.
So it's huge the impact that's happening here.
So Bubba is now about 10 miles from downtown.
This is County A here and then this is County L.
And so there's a nice plot of land
up there just north of Tomahawk.
So 2013 the Thunder Parade now offers rides
also to anybody over the age of 65.
So maybe, I don't think they're asking for IDs.
So if your close, I'm sure you could go
and get a ride on the Harley for the parade.
And anyone under 18 that has a disability.
So along with those that are visually impaired
they're expanding again
to the local community and reaching out.
Now I mentioned about Brigadoon on Wheels
is a miraculous community that rises
infrequently and then goes away for a long time.
And that's what we're gonna look at here.
So we're gonna start with the Thunder Parade
and the activities in town
with Sara Park and the Street Party.
And I've got a lot of photographs.
As we look at this I'd like to you--
well, first I'll show the map here
to show you this is right downtown.
This is the Sara Park area.
The Street Dance occurs right here
between this Railway Street
and Fourth Street here on Wisconsin Avenue.
Which is so this whole block is kind of representing
the whole Street Dance and Party downtown.
They'll be a band right here a band down on this end.
Often times the Rodeo also has a band on their deck.
I mean there's music everywhere.
On top of all of this and on top
of Bubba's event north of town,
almost all of the local bars have live bands, as well.
I mean there's that many people that,
they can serve us all of them
by having bands at every venue just about.
Lots and lots of music and lots
of things to do during this event.
So what we're gonna look at is,
the things again that connect to community here.
The idea of making sure that non-profits
in your community can benefit
from something like this.
We're gonna look at the portable toilets.
I know it doesn't sound too exciting,
but let's think about the infrastructure needs
of something like this.
And what is it that communities create
or provide for one another?
It's like having the water and sewage department
in a city, we gotta think about that
for a weekend event.
Trash collection, as well.
We've got our trash collection in town
that we count on every week.
How do you take care of something
like that for a weekend venue?
What are the local businesses doing?
Many of the local businesses offer discounts
to Harley riders or Harley attendees.
And they'll, maybe 10% off
and then they'll donate that 10% back
to the Muscular Dystrophy Association.
So it helps with the fund raising events.
Lots of non-local vendors, as well.
And that's been a little bit of a point
of disagreement in some previous years
because local vendors will come in
and set up their shop and make a lot of money,
but then maybe not help for some of the...
security, maybe police protection, things like that.
So they've worked out some agreements
over the years for kind of,
not really a tax, but a fee to help
with those kind of things.
Oop, I did I put Non-Profit fund raisers,
those are all duplicated aren't they?
That's what I do for doing that too quickly today, I apologize.
We'll see the pictures and it'll go through fast.
Alright here, this I'll go just quickly.
But look at the variety of ages of people attending this.
This is a State Patrol leading the parade
after the truck went through.
And also the different types of bikes
and the characters perhaps,
costumes on some.
One thing that's you'll see that is common
in nearly every single photograph is smiles.
And along the 17 mile long ride or so,
everybody's waving and
the whole community is lined up.
And people have tailgate parties
in their driveways to...
to welcome all of these riders to Tomahawk.
The place where my family watches
is just about a mile away from the high school
where they take off from on King Road
and it's right where the speed limit changes
and increases, so their all gunning it
right there in that drive!
It's so awesome.
(Lisa and audience laughs)
It is so much fun!
Yeah, that's a coffin, yeah.
That thing we see is the idea
of traffic signs
that are added everywhere.
When you have 40,000 or 45,000 motorcycles
it is dangerous.
There have been deaths over the years,
very serious accidents.
They try to do what they can to minimize that.
Most of the locals know, but you know
it's still hard to see them, it's still hard.
People do their best.
But these temporary signs do help
to get people slowed down in advance
of some of these things.
The last couple years they've started putting
up temporary reduced speed areas,
lowering the speed limits on certain--
but they haven't been able to do it on US highways,
but certainly the county highways they've
been able to lower the speed limits.
And that's been very helpful.
No parking.
Where do we restrict vehicle movement here
and only allow motorcycles
in order to make this
a more welcoming place for them
and make it safer, as well.
So we have a lot of detours around the downtown venue.
And the community and the bikers
all cooperate with this pretty well.
This is actually the parking lot
of the Nelson's grocery store.
And the Nelson's is right back here,
there's the Ben Franklin.
And you can see they have some
of the employees helping to direct traffic
to get the bikes in one area
and cars are going in another.
Just again for safety and just
a great day, too having fun.
This is again I told you earlier that I took
these pictures for those that were here earlier,
very early in the morning because of the crowds.
It is crowded, it's crowded down there.
And so a lot of these you're not gonna see
all the bikes that you could if you were up there yourself.
But you can see this one, this venue,
the owners came from Bradley, West Virginia.
So this is a big money maker for people
not only locally, but a lot of people
that travel to these different rides
and can make quite a nice living.
A lot of the non-profits in town
put up food stands and again you can see
there's no people around it
because I did go very early in the morning,
so you could see the signs.
Otherwise it'd been so crowded
you wouldn't have been able to see them.
The fire department.
I don't know what class, it's just
a class fund raiser, I don't know.
Swim Club, you can see the kids
just sitting around while mom and dad
are getting ready.
And lots of Porta Pottys, lots and lots of those.
That's the west end of Wisconsin Avenue
where one of the--
That's the stage inside that trailer
there for the band later in the evening.
And the employment agency
hoping that they're gonna find some people
that are coming up on Harleys
that want to learn how to be mi--
be a motorcycle manufacturing technician.
Lot, lots of opportunities for that in Tomahawk.
More venues.
Lots of orange.
And again this is like 11 in the morning
here on this shot.
You can already see how many motorcycles are there.
And what will eventually happen
is there will be no vehicles.
No, no four-wheeled vehicles.
And there'll be another line,
two rows of bicycles down the, er, motorcycles
down the middle of the street, as well.
Everybody else left to park somewhere else.
Every business has Welcome Bikers signs.
That's really nice
and very welcoming.
In this bottom thing here,
just showing the official sponsors.
The top couple rows are all those
that are right in that downtown area.
But the bottom two rows there, Happy Snapper,
and that's a typo there,
it's Twin Bay Resort, and Cockatiels,
those are all outside of the city.
So their hoping to make sure to get
some of the people coming,
as they're going out on one of their rides.
And what, another one this is a trash barrel.
Cockatiels bar is trying to at least
get some image in the riders' head
that there's another place to go
and they're gonna see that because
it's helping with crowd control, as well
and keeping things clean.
So Bubba's Big Party up on the north side
of Lake Nokomis, little bit different.
So again up here about 10 miles
from the downtown proper.
And we see again the idea of traffic signs
that we're gonna have to put in and traffic management.
But because this is private property
he's gonna have to hire his
own security forces up there
to handle with crowd control
and stuff as well.
Portable toilets again are gonna be an issue
as far as creating community.
The trash collection, he has his own stores.
You gotta think about potable water
and shower facilities.
And there's still the non-profit fund raising.
This is an aerial shot, the next four I believe
are from MF Helicopters.
They're out of East Troy, Wisconsin
and they were so generous to let me
use these shots for this.
I saw them at the event and I have horrible
motion sickness so I knew I--
Even if I wanted to pay for it
I would not be able to take the photographs to do it.
And I chatted with them and they said,
"Oh, I'll just get you some photographs."
Thank you so much, that was so nice.
This is facing North you can see the North arrow
up there for our geographers, okay.
This is the campground area, okay.
This is the tent where they have
the bands in the evening.
This is where we have the Barstool Races.
Yeah, yeah, I'll show ya.
We've got some pictures coming up.
And some of the vendors here and such.
And I've got some other pictures here, there.
And this is just from the East
and a little bit up to the North from there.
But what I want you to look at
is this grid layout, right?
Normally this is just a field.
It used to be alfalfa pretty regularly.
Nice grid layout, so we have streets, intersections.
We see here where they have their campers
kind of in a circle.
I'm gonna get you another one coming up.
There's one, right here.
You've heard of gated communities?
It's certainly giving us the impression
that some are allowed in and some are not, right?
And it might just be for fun.
You know, just hey let's just do it,
we can have our own little party in the sun.
Let's call it a neighborhood
instead of the gated community.
Let's do it that way, right?
But you can see quite a few of them in here.
And actually there's one over here,
where they actually have their HOG group,
their Harley Owners Group,
their special name on a big flag.
So all of the people that came from
that particular Harley Owners Group,
all camped together in their own community, as well.
Their own neighborhood inside this larger community.
Here's another example of that here, as well.
And fund raisers again, too.
This is for a boy's group home in Prentice.
Prentice is just about, not quite,
about a half a mile,
or half an hour, I'm sorry, west of Tomahawk.
Girl Scouts and recycling aluminum.
The Nokomis Fire Department is actually
on this land area on the south side of the land there.
And they saw this as a tremendous
opportunity for fund raising.
They also have a church service there on Sunday morning.
One thing that they also have
and that's advertised in the booklet
every year that announces the events
is AA meetings and Al Anon meetings,
all over the city during this week.
It's interesting about this raffle
that you would think it says Harley-Davidson raffle
and I thought, "Oh, I didn't realize
that they were selling tickets for it up here, as well.
I thought it was just down
at the sanctioned event in town."
I mean you look at it and it says 10th Annual.
So you look a little closer
and it actually says Marytown and St. Cloud.
For those of you that not familiar with those
we'll do the Wisconsin hand thing you know where--
Lake Winnebago's right here.
St. Cloud is kind of in between
Fond du Lac and Sheboygan between
Lake Winnebago and Lake Michigan over there.
So they're actually selling raffle tickets
to benefit their area.
Which is good, if it's a fund raiser, why not right?
But that's interesting there.
And they're giving away a Harley,
so people are buying tickets.
And it's the people watching and they're looking
at these beautiful motorcycles.
It would keep you busy all day.
Okay, so now Trash Collection.
Regularly the pick up truck with
a couple of guys on the back goes through
and picks up the trash through the neighborhood, okay.
You can see the sign here that says Fourth Street.
They're all labeled so you can find
your way home the next day.
Maybe that's a fenced yard, I don't know,
kind of telling people to stay out.
I also took the picture because of the Packers tent.
This is the Intersection of 8th and Main.
The sign's a little bent on the 8th thing.
There's 7th and Main.
See down here that is a sign
for one of those gated communities or neighborhoods
that was one of the Harley Owners Group's signs,
it was their name.
And I didn't get up close enough to that one.
But they provide water for the campers there, too.
The trailer for showers.
Right over here you toss in some money
and get tokens and then you can go
in and get enough water, you know,
certain amount of time for each token,
so you can shower.
So we've taken care of
the infrastructure of water supply.
A number of these are set up throughout the campgrounds.
There's also trucks going around
with firewood as well, quite regularly.
I think one thing to really point out
here is the ATM.
(audience laughs)
And I do remember seeing in one of
the annual pamphlets, brochures for the event
when Bubba first moved up to
the north side of the Lake Nokomis,
one of the real promotional things he said
is that he had Internet access, as well for people.
Harley owners have a lot of money.
Those motorcycles are expensive.
And you saw how many have campers.
You know this is not a cheap thing to do.
So him offering Internet access is pretty smart
'cause I'm going to guess a lot of the folks
probably still have business they need to take care of
while they're off on the Ride.
And having access to the Internet is really helpful.
Here's our Bar Stool Races.
You can see the, well there's the stool itself.
There's the legs, okay.
There's a few more.
It's pretty crazy.
It's fun, they go on a small,
kind of modified oval.
And there's some tipping over involved occasionally.
But it's fun, it's a lot of fun.
They take it quite seriously.
This is a big deal other than the fun,
other than the building of community.
In 2003, the riders themselves
spent 12 million dollars up there.
And then the multiplier effect to the region
added up to 84 million by 2014.
We're looking at 22.5 million dollars
of direct spending from the riders alone...
in the region.
And we talk region, we're talking all the way down to us.
Say within a 90 mile radius.
We see a benefit from that of almost 190 million dollars.
So from something that started out with 21 riders
back in 1982, this thing has become quite special
and a heck of a fund raiser for
the Muscular Dystrophy Association.
And that's a reminder quite often to people
as they're around celebrating and having fun,
you see these pretty regularly,
"Free Admission, but please, please donate to MD"
After all, this is what it's all about.
So it's a wonderful, wonderful event.
I hope you all can spend some time up there
sometime in the future.
And I wanna thank you for listening.
(audience applause)