There probably wasn’t a kid in town who hadn’t pretended to be Evel Knievel.
Pedaling furiously on Huffy, Schwinn and Roadmaster bicycles, children raced toward makeshift, miniature ramps built from dirt mounds, wooden boards and concrete blocks. If they hit the inclines perfectly, they enjoyed glorious moments of hang time and landed safely on the other side. If they miscalculated, they suffered spectacular, noisy and often painful crack-ups.
No matter the outcome, kids were bound to try again.
The summer of 1974 was the summer of Evel Knievel in Northeast Ohio.
At the peak of his popularity, the 36-year-old motorcycle daredevil made two high-profile local appearances 40 years ago while making final preparations to jump across Idaho’s Snake River Canyon in a steam-powered rocket.
The first event was Memorial Day weekend when Knievel performed before more than 40,000 cheering fans during Rick Case Appreciation Days at Dragway 42 in West Salem. Clad in a star-spangled, white-leather jumpsuit and matching helmet, Knievel entertained the audience with motorcycle stunts, including standing wheelies, before ramping up the thrills with a series of jumps: first four Mack trucks, then six and finally 10.
Knievel had broken dozens of bones in previous stunts, but everything went smoothly that weekend. The audience roared with approval.
Staying at the Brown Derby Motor Inn on Route 8 near the Ohio Turnpike, Knievel held a news conference to discuss his September jump across the 2,300-feet wide, 500-feet deep Snake River Canyon.
“If I do make it, I’ll just grab a fist of dirt and say, ‘Thank you, God,’” he told reporters. “If I don’t, well, I’ll just wait for all you people here to catch up with me.”
When asked if he did any special training for the Skycycle X-2 rocket, Knievel joked: “I’ve learned to say the Lord’s Prayer in five seconds.”
Knievel made a special trip to Akron Children’s Hospital and visited young patients for three hours. The misty-eyed stuntman was so touched by what he saw that he made a few calls, ordered 80 Evel Knievel toys from Children’s Palace and returned the next morning to distribute them with his pal, Rick Case, a motorcycle and automobile dealer who was helping to promote the Snake River jump.
Case arranged for Knievel to return to Akron on Aug. 17 as a celebrity guest of the All-American Soap Box Derby. Pandemonium swept Derby Downs during the festivities, which occurred a week after President Richard Nixon resigned from office. Carrying a diamond-encrusted cane, Knievel signed as many autographs as he could during pre-derby activities.
“If there was a lesson to be learned in Saturday’s racing festivities, it was that Evel Knievel is a genuine American hero,” the Beacon Journal reported. “The crowd roared as Knievel, in a white sport coat and pants with blue trimmings, flashed by in the derby parade.
“Everywhere Knievel went, he was mobbed by fans. At times, Akron policemen had to form a ring around him to hold back the youngsters pleading for an autograph.”
Knievel knew everything about motorcycles but little about gravity-powered racers. Much to his chagrin, he agreed to participate in the Oil Can Derby, a celebrity race against comedian Eddie Bracken and fast-food clown Ronald McDonald.
The crowd cheered as the three raced downhill in derby cars. Darned if the red-wigged clown didn’t finish first and win the Oil Can Trophy. If only the race had been on motorcycles!
Before the All-American race, Knievel took a microphone and addressed the masses, calling the Soap Box Derby “one of the greatest traditional events in all the country.”
“I know there are a lot of young people in the audience,” he said. “Once the doctors said I was going to die. Then they said I would never walk again. There’s a reason I can. I adhere to the laws of this society. I never drink alcohol to any great extent and I never participated in narcotics.”
Then he couldn’t resist making a little sales pitch for Snake River Canyon.
“If you are there at the jump or are watching it on closed-circuit TV, blow like hell ’cause I’m going to need it.”
Yes, closed-circuit television. Tickets cost $10 in advance and $12 at the door of the Akron Civic Theatre and Cleveland Public Auditorium to view the Idaho stunt.
If losing to Ronald McDonald was bad, things got worse a few weeks later. The Snake River Canyon jump turned out to be a fiasco.
After months of anticipation, Knievel climbed into the Skycycle X-2 on a 108-foot, 56-degree launching pad at the edge of the canyon.
The rocket took off with a mighty whoosh Sept. 8 but its parachute opened upon blastoff, halting the momentum and forcing the vehicle to drift into the chasm, leaving a trail of red smoke.
Knievel survived the incident, but his pride was bruised. People who paid to watch the brief stunt on closed-circuit TV were not too pleased either.
Although the jump failed, the Skycycle X-2 was a popular attraction when Rick Case Honda put it on display in the mid-1970s on Arlington Road.
Knievel tried to get back on track in May 1975 by jumping a motorcycle across 13 buses in London. He broke his pelvis during the rough landing and announced his immediate retirement. Five months later, however, he successfully jumped 14 Greyhound buses at Kings Island near Cincinnati.
Hard times fell on the daredevil in the late 1970s. He lost endorsement deals after being convicted of beating a movie studio executive with a baseball bat.
After declaring bankruptcy, he found himself living at a North Royalton motel in 1983 with his wife, Linda, and 4-year-old daughter, Alicia. He had given up dangerous stunts to concentrate on painting.
“You have to pay a price for success,” he told a reporter.
“The public thinks Evel Knievel should be able to jump over an ocean. How can a man live up to that?”
Knievel was 69 when he passed away in Clearwater, Fla., in 2007. He had survived countless brushes with death, but diabetes and lung disease finally caught up to him.
Today, son Robbie Knievel continues the daredevil tradition, completing more than 350 motorcycle jumps. As long as there are children who ride speeding bicycles over makeshift ramps, the Knievel name will never die.
Copy editor Mark J. Price is author of The Rest Is History: True Tales From Akron’s Vibrant Past, a book from the University of Akron Press. He can be reached at 330-996-3850 or mjprice@thebeaconjournal.com.