December 4, 2007
"Ladies and gentlemen, and especially little children. I'm glad you're all here to witness what may very well be my grisly death."
Posted by pete at December 4, 2007 10:17 PMAs you may have noticed, whiterose.org was down for the last nine days or so while webmeisters Ginger and Michael fled the fetid confines of New Jersey for the Elysian fields of Austin, TX. While this really gave me an opportunity to send anonymous death threats to Reveille catch up on great works of literature, I was rather bummed I wasn't able to comment on the death of yet another of my childhood idols, Evel Knievel:
Evel Knievel's hard life killed him -- it just took longer than he or anyone else might have expected.
The hard-living motorcycle daredevil, whose bone-breaking, rocket-powered jumps and stunts made him an international icon in the 1970s, died Friday. He was 69.
He had been in failing health for years, suffering from diabetes and pulmonary fibrosis, an incurable condition that scarred his lungs. He had undergone a liver transplant in 1999 after nearly dying of hepatitis C, likely contracted through a blood transfusion after one of his many spills. He also suffered two strokes in recent years.
I was a typical '70s kid in a lot of ways: I saw Star Wars about 20 times when it was released, I pleaded with my parents to let me stay up on Saturdays to enjoy the exploits of John Belushi and Dan Aykroyd, and I watched Knievel's exploits with the kind of gape-mouthed fascination peculiar to boys who have yet to reach double digits.
I had the Stunt Cycle, I watched the shitty movies, and I died a little inside when the chute deployed too early on the disastrous Snake River Canyon jump.
Unsurprisingly, A&E re-ran their Knievel Biography last weekend, and I was reminded of my favorite story; the time Knievel went after the author of an unauthorized biography with a baseball bat...and two broken arms.
He was a womanizer, an insufferable egomaniac, and a glorious bastard, and the world is a duller place for his having left it.
Rest in as much peace as your shattered bones will allow, Evel.
TTTWLaM’s story was so much better before I realized he was quoting someone else.
TTTWLaM’s story was so much better before I realized he was quoting someone else.
Suuuure he was.
Evel Knievel is one of those figures who should be fictional, or, if we must accept his mundane reality, then he should at least be immortal and unaging, like Dick Clark. It’s a roundhouse kick straight to the mortality for any 70s kid to see a picture of Evel all wrinkled up and white haired; to find out the guy actually DIED… jesus. I figured he was like Captain Scarlet… y’know… indestructible.
This forum post, from someone named Your Mother over at the Portal Of Evil, certainly deserves repeating.
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11/30/07
I wrote about this a long time ago, but I guess it bears repeating. Now, with more detail:
I met Evel Knievel on my birthday. I think it was my 22nd (which would’ve been 1990). What I remember for sure was that I was having a great fucking day. Many fun and unexepected things happened that day. One thing that sticks out in my mind was that the Bangles were shooting a video and needed a stack of ’80s cassettes as a prop. I lived right across the street and was able to provide the needed prop in ten minutes. Then my roommate was in a Cheap Trick video and wanted to wear my skirt for the shoot. I didn’t even work in props, but I was Johnny-On-The-Spot that day!
After work, the aforementioned roommate and I went to a local bar for a couple early drinks. While sitting at the bar, the bartender asked us if we knew who Evel Knievel was. Well, fuckin’ duh! Who doesn’t know who he is?
We started simultaneously babbling tomboy childhood memories of the greatest daredevil who ever lived. The bartender stopped us and pointed out Evel Knievel sitting at the end of the bar.
We turned into the two giggliest girls you ever saw! We damned near swooned when he rolled up his sleeves to show us his Snake River Canyon jump scars. I even told him how I got the Evel Knievel rev-up motorcycle toy with the plastic tracks for my 8th birthday and how I used to set up jumps for it in my parents’ basement. Oh, I turned into the biggest dweeb ever. But I was on top of the motherfuckin’ world. It was my birthday and I was at my local watering hole sharing a beer with EVEL FUCKIN’ KNIEVEL!
I then asked him the one question that he’s probably been asked more than any other question: Is it true that you’ve broken every bone in your body?
He stared into my eyes and, without missing a beat, replied “As far as your concerned, little lady, there’s one bone I ain’t broken yet.”
I will always have a huge soft spot in my heart for that asshole.
Godspeed, Evel.