1 AMCA VIKING CHAPTER NEWSLETTER OFFICERS December 2014 [email protected]PRESIDENT: Ron Spargo 952-443-2020 [email protected]VICE-PRESIDENT: Kerry Rasmussen 651-430-1332 [email protected]http://www.vikingmc.org DIRECTORS: Mark Jilk 651-207-2190 [email protected]Bob Hopf 612-867-5654 [email protected]Timothy O’Keeffe 651-675-6560 [email protected]Craig Kotval 651-269-1975 [email protected]TREASURER: Roy Williams 612-377-6146 [email protected]MEMBERSHIP: Kathi Rimnac 612-825-2550 [email protected]CLUB HISTORIAN: Tom Jones 763-533-9163 DEPUTY JUDGE: Jerry Richards 651-482-0096 [email protected]WEB/EMAIL: Doug Nelson 612-559-9595 [email protected]NEWSLETTER: Tim Gadban 651-235-5898 [email protected]PUBLISHED QUARTERLY INSIDE THIS ISSUE : Upcoming Club Events ………... 2 President’s Message, Editor’s Note & Memorials .…………….. 3 2014 Davenport Run …..…...….. 4 Wings & Wheels …….……..….. 5 Fall Swap Meet ……..………….. 6 Mystery Ride & Want Ads……... 7 Extended Version (EV) with extra features, photos, projects & sto- ries ............................................ 9-25 Keith Kizer has been appointed as AMCA Executive Director. Kizer, who formerly ran the AMA Prostar Drag Racing Series and served as the Senior Director for AMA Pro Racing, will oversee the AMCA’s various strategic projects, events, programs and daily operations. Kizer will work from his office in Huntsville, Alabama, and report to the AMCA’s Board of Directors. SECRETARY: Diane Nelson 612-965-1415 [email protected]Congrats to all new and re- elected Board Members!! “Keith has a long history of developing and growing membership-based organizations, from his co-founding of the AMA Prostar Drag Racing Series to reviving the road-racing side of AMA Pro Racing from 2006 to 2008 prior to its sale,” said Richard Spagnolli, AMCA President. “His experience and management expertise are sure to help the AMCA continue the culture and tradition of serving the antique motorcycle community as it has for the last 60 years.” DON’T FORGET - IT’S TIME TO RENEW MEMBERSHIP, BOTH WITH AMCA NA- TIONAL AND THE VIKING CHAPTER. BEST BANG FOR THE BUCK EVER!!
Viking Chapter AMCA Inc. P.O. Box 18304, Minneapolis, MN 55418
DECEMBER 2014
WANTED: HRD/Vincent project bike, basket case, pile of parts or a single part, sheet metal, tools, books, etc. Please contact me about the items you have. Thanks, Tim. Email [email protected] or call 651-675-6560, 9am - 9pm MN
T’was the night before Christmas at the motorcycle store,
The sales clerks were gone; they’d locked up the door.
Back in service, the tools were hung with great care,
The floors had been swept, the workbenches bare.
Sales had been brisk, filling staff with elation,
As they headed down south for their winter vacation.
The new shiny sport bikes had all been sold out,
And all that was left was an Indian Scout,
A Norton Commando, A Rudge Multi too,
And a black BMW R32.
A Vincent, a Matchless and Velocette,
And a drippy old Brough that wouldn’t start on a bet.
“This stinks,” said the Norton, “We’re just as fine,
As those Japanese bikes the kids buy all the time.”
“You’re right,” said the Vincent as he grew agitated,
“All I need is to get my back tire inflated.
Then I could compete with the best of ‘em yet.”
“Me too! I’m still fast,” cried the old Velocette.
“If someone was handy, someone was smart,
They’d know how to fix us and get us to start.”
And so while they rumbled and whined and complained,
They didn’t notice a visitor came.
He was dressed all in leather, black head to toe
And his helmet had reflective stickers that brightly glowed.
His beard was snow white. It reached to his chest.
How he got in the door was anyone’s guess.
He looked them all over. “Merry Christmas,” he said.
Are you fellows available to pull my big sled?”
“Who, us?” laughed the Matchless. “We’re rusty and old.
Nobody wants us, that’s why we’re not sold.
The kids want electric, not our old kickstarts.
These young punks think we’re just bikes for old farts.”
“My Lucas headlight hasn’t worked well in years,”
Said the Rudge. “And my gearbox is missing some gears.
I’d be much obliged if you’d look at my choke,
And the earthing bushing in my magneto is broke.”
“My mix is too rich, I think,” said the Beemer.
“Does anyone know how to set the carb leaner?”
Then Santa said, “Hey, stop the whining you guys.
You’re legends and history in many mens’ eyes.
So what if you’re rusty and don’t look brand new?
Hypermotards and Busas wouldn’t be here without you.”
Then the vintage bikes lights started glowing with pride.
And the Norton Commando said, “Let’s take a ride!”
“I’m ready, let’s go, come on!” said the Brough,
“Let’s get it in gear and show’em our stuff.”
They took to the road, their pipes roared like thunder.
And Santa sat back in his sled filled with wonder.
And he said as he watched them race into the night,
“Merry Christmas to all, and to all a safe ride.”
21
This is the story about the annual Catholic Church Polka Picnic in Buena Vista, where we stop on our way
back from Davenport. I have heard more than one club member say that this is their favorite part of the ride.
Where & how legalized gambling in Iowa was launched back in 1971 by Chuck Offenburger
In this spring of 2014, our Greene County in west central Iowa is asking the Iowa Racing and Gaming Commission to grant a li-
cense so that Wild Rose Entertainment can develop a casino, hotel and conference center to serve the area around Jefferson. As
we’ve learned how big, profitable and philanthropic the gambling industry now is in the state, our columnist recalled a stop he made
in 2001 in the little place in northeast Iowa where, in 1971, the new era of gambling was launched. It’s quite a story, and remember,
it was written 13 years ago.
In the midst of the lottery frenzy that has had everyone running to convenience stores to buy the $1 chances, Carla and I found our-
selves driving north of Dubuque in northeast Iowa on our way to see Effigy Mounds National Monument. And right in our path on
the Great River Road, we encountered North Buena Vista, a town of 150. “Bingo!” I yelled. “I’m buying a Powerball ticket right
here!” Much to my surprise, I learned you cannot buy a Powerball ticket, or any other kind of state lottery ticket, in North Buena
Vista. “That fact,” I said, “is news!” Carla rolled her eyes, obviously having forgotten, as most people have, the special place in
Iowa history held by little “Buenie,” as the locals call their town.
A SUNDAY NIGHT RAID
On the Sunday night of Labor Day weekend 30 years ago, two agents of the state Bureau of Criminal Investigation drove into town
as the annual “Buenie Picnic” held as a benefit by the local Immaculate Conception Catholic Church was winding up its day of fri-
volity and fund raising. The agents confiscated an illegal “wheel of fortune” gambling device, bingo equipment, five decks of cards,
a dice table and they noticed how beer was being served illegally. The next day, parish priest Rev. Carl Ruhland was formally
charged with “running a gambling house.”
The agents, who expressed regret about having to make the raid, were well aware that the Buenie Picnic was a 40-year-old tradition
that typically attracted 8,000 or more people in one day, raising as much as $65,000 to help support the Catholic elementary school
in nearby Guttenberg. But they’d been ordered into North Buena Vista by Iowa’s colorful Attorney General, Richard C. Turner. He
had apparently been challenged by a Des Moines Register reporter, who was asking what Turner was going to be doing about the
illegal gambling and drinking the Register reported was happening at the church picnic.
Robert Ludovissy, 64, now the mayor of North Buena Vista, recalled last week that the local people later heard that state agents were
first sent into the north part of Buena Vista County, nearly 300 miles away in northwest Iowa. Then the authorities realized the pic-
nic was happening in a little town named North Buena Vista that none of them had ever heard of.
Two weeks after the raid, Father Ruhland pleaded guilty to the charge in Clayton County District Court in Elkader and paid a $100
fine. En route to Elkader that day, parishioners and other supporters formed a caravan of cars behind Father Ruhland’s car, which
was topped with a big sign that said “Come to Buenie for Fun.” They packed the courthouse, the Register reported. They roared
when, immediately after the legal proceedings, Father Ruhland stood up in front of the judge and yelled, “There will be free coffee
for everyone at Angie’s,” a popular Elkader restaurant then.
A HUGE IMPACT ON THE STATE
The future of Iowa was changed dramatically after what happened in North Buena Vista.
The idea of state agents raiding church picnics and charging priests was an outrage to most Iowans. Legislators had already began
receiving pressure that the time had come to liberalize Iowa’s “blue laws,” which prohibited gambling anytime, beer and liquor sales
on Sunday and other things we now take for granted. After the Buenie raid, the Iowa Legislature in 1972 passed a joint resolution
calling for a public vote to repeal the Constitutional ban on gambling. That repeal vote came in the 1972 general election, and in
1973, the Legislature legalized bingo, raffles and other low-stakes games of chance. That opened the door.
Three decades later, Iowa’s gambling industry has now grown to include 10 casino boats, three race tracks with pari-mutuel wager-
ing, three Native American casinos and ubiquitous slot machines, as well as the Iowa Lottery “scratch ticket” games and the national
Powerball game which is headquartered in Des Moines. Gaming receipts for the state government are nearing $200 million per year.
Thousands of people are employed at the casinos and tracks. Gambling attracts millions of tourists to Iowa. Addiction treatment pro-
grams have sprung up.
It was bound to start somewhere. And little North Buena Vista happened to be the place. Why? How?
22
OH THOSE REPORTERS!
“That son of a B turned us in, that’s how,” Father Ruhland, who is now 82 and retired in Dubuque, said with a laugh last week – and
“son of a B” was the exact term he used. He was talking about Veryl “Sandy” Sanderson, who is now 56, a former reporter for the
Des Moines Register who is now managing editor of the weekly Press Citizen newspaper in Ankeny, just north of Des Moines. Actually, Sanderson didn’t turn anybody in. He just wrote a story describing what was going on in front of him at the Buenie Picnic
on Sunday, Sept. 5, 1971. Here is the top of his story, as it ran on page one of the Register the next morning, Labor Day:
“NORTH BUENA VISTA, IA. – Beer sales and gambling were included in the activities Sunday at Immaculate Conception Catholic
Church’s annual parish picnic here. “A plastic cup of beer sold for 25 cents. “Plays on the games of chance costs from 25 cents to $2 a bet. “Iowa law forbids the sale of beer on Sundays and forbids gambling at any time. “However, the gamblers, who ranged from elderly grandmothers to teen-agers, and the beer drinkers did not seem to mind.”
What made Sanderson decide to go cover the Buenie Picnic on the Sunday of a holiday weekend?
“A Register photographer named Maury Horner and I had been to Wisconsin the week before the picnic on a story,” Sanderson re-
called. “As we drove back to Des Moines, we decided to stop in Dubuque for a beer, and the guys in the bar were asking us if we
were going to come back up on Sunday for this ‘Buenie Picnic.’ They said it was a great time – all kinds of beer and gambling in
this tiny little town tucked away up on the Mississippi River north of Dubuque. I said something about, ‘That does sound like a good
story, maybe we will.’ “As we drove on home, Maury said, ‘You know, Sandy, I’m not sure covering that story would be such a
good idea. It sounds like it has trouble written all over it.’ He turned out to be right about that.”
SLIPPING INTO “BUENIE” FOR A STORY.
But Sanderson told his bosses at the Register about the big, wide-open picnic, and they thought it sounded like something that should
be covered, too. So on that Sunday, Sanderson and photographer Larry Neibergall flew to Dubuque in a chartered airplane, arranged
to borrow a car and drove to North Buena Vista. The town sits in a deep valley in the bluffs right along the river. There were hun-
dreds of cars already there by the time the Register duo flew over about 10:30 a.m., capturing the scene in an aerial photo. More peo-
ple were arriving on their small boats at the local marina, then being hauled up the hill into town in a pick-up truck that had been
dubbed on its sign, “Tijuana Taxi.”
“The town was teeming with people by the time we got there,” Sanderson said. “There was so much traffic they had deputy sheriffs
out there directing traffic. They had great meals – I still remember how good the food was – and they had all kinds of drinking and
gambling going on.”
He said he and Neibergall never identified themselves as being from the Register. Instead, they just observed what was happening
and Neibergall shot photos as discreetly as he could. They left for Dubuque by 3 p.m.
“I quickly wrote up my story and I dictated it by phone back to the Register from the Dubuque airport,” Sanderson said. “Then we
flew back to Des Moines so Larry could get his film processed and the photos ready for the paper.”
So, Sanderson’s story was written and published with no mention of the raid, or the arrest of the priest, which, remember, happened
at 10:15 p.m. that Sunday night.
“I had no idea that happened,” Sanderson said. “When we got back to Des Moines, I probably checked with the Register to make
sure my story was O.K., and then went home. I was headed back out of town the next day to go to New Orleans on a story, so I
wanted to see my family and get some sleep.”
SO, WHAT WAS THE STATE GOING TO DO ABOUT IT? He now says that sometime late that Sunday afternoon or evening, another Register reporter read the draft of his story about the
Buenie Picnic as it was being edited and prepared for the newspaper. Sanderson recalls that reporter being Michael Sorkin, who see-
ing mention of the illegal gambling and drinking, decided to pursue it a bit further. “Sorkin called (Attorney General Richard)
Turner,” Sanderson said. “He asked Turner what he was going to do about it.”
There was no mention of any call to Turner, or reaction from him, in Sanderson’s Monday story. However, in the Tuesday Register,
Sorkin authored a page one story about the raid under a bold, banner headline across the top of the page: “CHARGE PRIEST IN
GAMBLING.” It told the story about the two BCI agents going into North Buena Vista late Sunday night and confiscating the gam-
bling equipment. Father Ruhland was formally charged the next morning in a “county attorney’s information” filed before a district
court judge. No bond was required, as the judge released the priest on his own recognizance.
23
Sorkin is now an investigative reporter for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, where he’s worked for the past 20 years. After he left the
Register, he was hired to be an investigator in Attorney General Turner’s office, then later returned to newspapering in St. Louis. I probed Sorkin’s memory last week about the North Buena Vista story, and whether he made the call to Turner on that long ago
evening. But after hearing some details of the story, Sorkin said, “I have no recollection of that. It’s just not ringing any bells.” He
couldn’t recall writing the second-day story that wound up with the banner headline, either.
Well, it has been 30 years ago. Sanderson remembered that in the year after the raid, Turner “proceeded to close down all the gam-
bling in the state – all the country club calcuttas, all the gambling at the county fairs.” And that led to increasing pressure on legisla-
tors to change the Iowa laws.
INVITED BACK TO “BUENIE” AS SPECIAL GUESTS. When it came time for the 1972 Buenie Picnic, Sanderson recalled, the local folks invited both he and Turner to attend as special
guests. They did, making the trip separately. “They had big signs up that day saying, ‘Buenie Picnic – Turner-Sanderson Style’,”
Sanderson said. “There was no beer, no gambling, it was pretty subdued. They were not happy campers. Turner had quite an entou-
rage of people with him, so when he left, I decided I better get out of town, too, because a bunch of those good ol’ boys were looking
me over like they might do something. I wasn’t real popular there, of course.”
Turner served as attorney general until the end of 1978, went into private practice for a year and then was named U.S. Attorney in
Des Moines. He served there about five years before his death in the middle 1980s.
Sanderson remembers that he received so many angry phone calls at his residence after the big story broke “that I had to get an
unlisted phone number.” Like most other Iowans, he is amazed at how big the gambling industry has become in Iowa, and that a
long-ago story that he wrote helped launch it. “I happen to like casinos as entertainment,” he said, “but I didn’t go into that story
with the thought that it would lead to gambling being legalized, or anything like that. It just seemed like an interesting story to me,
that we had all this illegal gambling going on that was being ignored by law enforcement because it was at church picnics. North
Buenie just happened to be the one I heard about. “That did teach me a real lesson about journalism. From little things like a story
about a church picnic, the repercussions can be unforeseen. You have to be responsible and conscious of what can happen from your
work.” Sanderson is reflecting on his experience in North Buena Vista in his column in this Tuesday’s Ankeny Press Citizen.
NOW FOLKS CAN LAUGH ABOUT IT, SORT OF.
The retired Father Ruhland laughed frequently as he re-told his version of the story. “Yes, I laugh at it,” he said. “That’s the best
way to look at it. I have a clear conscience about it. I never felt like I did anything very seriously wrong. I gave people a little some-
thing to drink on a Sunday and let them gamble a little, and a lot of good came from the money. I could say to my good Lord, ‘I did-
n’t do anything against the Ten Commandments, and nobody got hurt.’ ”
He said when he was assigned to Immaculate Conception at North Buena Vista, “I was sent out there by the bishop to do something
about the children’s schooling. There was no school there, and we were sending them to St. Mary’s in Guttenberg. We had to buy a
bus, and the state wasn’t doing a damned thing about helping parochial school kids then. We had to raise money.” He said the
Buenie Picnic had been going on for years before he got involved. Church records indicate the first one was held in 1929. “They
were used to having a picnic,” he said. “I just helped them build it bigger and bigger.”
He said the two BCI agents who conducted the raid, “didn’t really want to be there. One of them later called me and said he felt bad
about what they had to do and wanted to take me out to dinner. I said, ‘The hell you do!’ ”
This week the church and town prepare for another “Buenie Family Picnic,” as the events are called now. It will begin on Sunday,
Sept. 2, with the traditional Polka Mass at 10:30 a.m., feature the same great chicken and ham dinners as usual, and feature quilts,
handcrafts, canned and baked goods. It will end in the early evening with the drawings for 160 prizes donated for the church raffle.
It is expected to draw up to 3,000 people, and will probably raise about $30,000 – both numbers less than half what they were 20 to
30 years ago.
THEN AND NOW.
“Those times were then, and these times are now,” said Mayor Ludovissy. “Things were different then. People back then were
really oriented to work and work and work for your church. Nobody wants to work that hard and that long anymore. When you
think back on those times when the picnic would raise $60,000 or more, when you think about that, to accumulate that much money
in one day in a little place like this was almost like a miracle.”
The huge crowds kept coming through the 1970s and ’80s. Beer was sold – with a license – in those years. There was limited, low-
stakes, legal gambling. There was the great food.
24
But after two, post-picnic vehicle accidents in the late 1980s resulted in dram shop settlements by the picnic’s insurance carrier, the
costs of the essential insurance became too high, Ludovissy said. Beer sales ended after the 1988 picnic, when Ludovissy recalls
“we poured beer from 13 spigots and sold 248 kegs.”
Buenie residents now have to drive to Guttenberg or Dubuque to buy their lottery tickets.
Lucille Ludovissy, 62, the mayor’s wife and partner in their Someplace Else Bar and Grill, said she sometimes wonders “why’d we
ever get raided in Buenie? Think about it. Now there’s gambling everywhere.”
She said that since the Buenie Picnic has tamed down, the town is now most famous for three things – “our cemetery up on the top of
the bluff, my bloody marys and my stuffed shrimp dinners.”
So, if you want to go to next weekend’s picnic and gamble, just for old times’ sake, what are your options? “We’ll have a bingo
game – and, yes, we do have a license for it,” said Patty Errthum, whose husband Marvin is in charge of the organizing committee.
“We probably wouldn’t even do that except that some of the older ladies like to play. And we’ll have a ‘Candy Wheel,’ where a
winning number will get you a piece of candy, although I don’t know if that is even really gambling.”
There is the parish raffle, for which $1 chances are being sold in advance, with prizes ranging from handmade quilts, oil for your car,
meals at area restaurants and small amounts of cash. When I heard about the raffle, I bought five tickets – four in my name so that if
I win I can go back and eat Lucille Ludovissy’s stuffed shrimp. The other one, just for fun, I put in the name of Veryl “Sandy” San-
derson, the reporter who gave North Buena Vista its place in Iowa history.
25
CLUB NEWS
VIKING CHAPTER BY-LAWS
As approved by the membership at the March 1995 meeting
Section I. Chapter Name
The name of this chapter shall be the VIKING CHAPER OF THE ANTIQUE MOTORCYCLE CLUB
OF AMERICA (AMCA), INC.
Section II. Chapter Purpose
The purpose of the Viking Chapter shall be to seek out antique, post antique and special interest motor-
cycles and to promote the preservation and restoration of those motorcycles. The Viking Chapter shall
abide by the rules and regulations of the AMCA.
Section III. Chapter Membership
All Viking Chapter members are required to be a member of the AMCA. Chapter membership shall
include the member’s spouse.
Section IV. Chapter Officers
The Viking Chapter shall have a board consisting of eight officers elected from the membership for a
period of two years. These officers are: President, Vice President, Secretary, Treasurer and four Direc-
tors.
Two Officers and two Directors are to be elected each year to provide an “overlap” of service for conti-
nuity of direction. In addition, the board shall assign a Newsletter Editor, Web Master and a Deputy
Judge who will serve as members of the board and have full voting rights as identical to other officers.
In the event a Board Member cannot complete a term, the remaining Board Members will select a re-
placement to complete the term.
Section V. Chapter Finances
Dues of fifteen dollars shall be paid to finance the operation of the Chapter as a nonprofit organization.
Spouse members are not required to pay dues. Dues are based on the calendar year regardless of when
a member joins.
Chapter Officers shall require approval of the general membership before
making expenditures exceeding $200.00.
Section VI. Chapter Meetings
Regular meetings will be held on a monthly basis. The members will be notified of each meeting by
the Chapter newsletter. Nominations of Officers and Directors will be held at the August meeting and
