The Vintage Mini Bike Family Photo Scrapbook

toomanytoys

Well-Known Member


Found a website where a woman is talking about her grandmother. She was 82 years old and rode around on a 1971 Mud Bug.

My memories of Grammy Helen are few, many of them involving hospital visits, though most are of her screaming and waving knives as she chased someone down the road. Was she a crazy woman or was it just for show? I do not know. I was too young to know. People around town called her “Helen the Hellion.” Seems like she was always screaming, always waving knives in the air, throwing ham sandwiches, and always running down the road, whenever she wasn’t reading bird books or tending to her massive flower garden. I was just 8 years old when she died of cancer. I remember her funeral. She wore a blue velvet gown. Some Atwaters showed up and started a fight. I don’t remember why. Grammy Helen was the oldest of my grandparents. She remembered horse drawn carriages and both World Wars. When Grammy Helen died, I inherited her land, her grandmother’s 200 year old rosebush, her Liberace records, her 1971 MTD 3-Wheel MudBug (yes, she was an 82 year old woman with an ATV), her comic books (which set a Guinness Book Record, for containing the largest and most complete run of Disney comic books), the family Bible/Grimoire (a giant and ancient Medieval volume weighing close to 40lbs and passed down through our family for centuries), and her title: Queen of the Gypsies, Hedgewitch, Witch Doctor, Fortune Teller, and caster of spells.
 
I suspect some folks on here have a nostalgic streak that is as strong as mine. I have posted a picture of my cousin and me alongside his old Cushman many years ago on several threads. My goal has always been to find another Cushman and recreate that old memory. He suffered a stroke many years ago (1986) and has not been able to work since. This summer I found an old Cushman on craigslist that was in Fargo. I went down one evening and bought it, although he could not get it to run and the thing had a very bad "restoration". Although it did not take to long to get running well, the body needed some attention. I took off the front fender and the rear trunk and had a local body shop do the repairs and the paint. The rims were bent and I had to buy one and I was able to straighten one. It rides nice and will do 40 on the road. Today turned out to be a great day for both Dan and myself. Just don't look too closely at the receding hairlines and the protruding bellies:laugh: The pictures will give you an idea what I had started my world of 2 wheeled adventures on and where it has taken me today. The old pic is one my mom took when they came to pick me up from spending a few days at my cousins. The next ones will show the before and after of my current Cushman Highlander 721 sitting in the same spot in the yard.

 
I stumbled across this story and these pics the other day....



The first is a photo of Jonnie King hard at work at his job as KAAY's (Little Rock, AR) Music Director in 1970:




"These were shot in front of the KAAY Building. That's me on my "Contest Giveaway Mini-Bike" in the Spring/Summer of 1971. I gave it away on my show!"



 
From: Motorcyclefanatic



"My wife gave me a birthday card this morning (51 years) that had a picture of me on the mini-bike I got for my 8th birthday. I sat a stared at that picture for quite a while, it really took me back."
 
Top