Hollister Kicks Its Annual Biker Rally to the Curb

This sunbaked town in the shadow of the Diablo Range sits at the unlikely crossroads of two distinct lifestyles: those of its hard-working farmer-ranchers and the often hell-raising motorcyclists who invade each summer.

The city known as the “Birthplace of the American Biker” plays host to an annual Fourth of July rally -- an engine-revving frenzy of tens of thousands of leather-clad partyers who rumble down Hollister’s main drag atop vintage Harleys, souped-up choppers, German-made touring bikes and just about everything else with an engine and pair of spoked wheels.

But the infamous event -- which inspired the 1953 Hollywood cult classic “The Wild One,” starring Marlon Brando -- has skidded to a halt.

The City Council voted earlier this month to cancel the rally, kick-starting a dispute that has divided this community of 38,000 residents, pitting San Benito County’s plain-talking sheriff, Curtis Hall, against Hollister’s Harley-riding mayor, Robert Scattini.

Hall calls the rally “a dirty, rotten, stinking event” that draws both Hells Angels and Mongols, competing gangs that he said had a tense face-off at last July’s rally. Scattini insists the bikers are an important part of his town’s history.

“Those bikers put Hollister on the map, and now these people want to turn their back on them,” he said. “Some people would rather celebrate July Fourth with a wine festival or rodeo or some pony pulling a covered wagon down Main Street. I’m not going to allow them to turn this into an unfriendly little town.”

Yet many are applauding the rally’s demise, saying the annual crush of cycles is so loud that it drives many residents away for the holiday and forces some pet owners to place their frightened animals on tranquilizers for the weekend.

“Some folks see those bikers as one big nuisance,” said Councilwoman Monica Johnson, noting that the rally draws up to 60,000 motorcyclists to Hollister each day over the holiday weekend. “That’s a lot of people. I have safety concerns. This is earthquake country. What happens if we have a big one when all those people are here?”

Cyclists see the move as a slap in the face to a Harley-riding, wheelie-popping tradition that dates back 60 years.

“Bikers are insulted by this,” said Marlon Moss, a local sign maker and rally enthusiast who repeats his first name when introducing himself: “That’s Marlon,” he says, “as in Brando.”

The event closes Hollister’s main thoroughfare to everything but the motorcyclists, who wander the downtown listening to live music and perusing the stalls of vendors selling everything from leather brassieres to motorcycle-shaped bottle openers. Many camp out. Others pack the town’s motels, eateries and bars.

But enthusiasts insist the event is more than just drinking beer and howling at the moon.

“These biker rallies are show-and-tell events,” Moss said. “People walk the streets and look at each other’s bikes. They meet old friends and make new ones.”

Depending on whom you ask, this town 90 miles south of San Francisco ran out of money or patience for its signature rally -- or both.

Officials say the event has simply become too expensive.

In 2004, state law enforcement officials began charging for security and traffic enforcement. Last fall, the city paid $250,000 after promoters balked at paying the bill.

Many motorcyclists are threatening to come anyway. “You can’t cancel freedom,” one wrote on a local Internet chat site. “Spread the word, we’re coming.” He added a postscript for Hollister officials: “The fools, the poor, poor fools.”

Perhaps no one is more upset than the customers at Johnny’s bar and grill, a biker hangout. The regulars claim that the ghost of Wino Willie is out there somewhere, riding his mythical motorcycle, and he’s one angry hombre.

Wino Willie Fortner, patrons say, was a hell-raising biker in a band called the Boozefighters that descended on Hollister in a notorious 1947 incident -- one that inspired Brando’s legendary role and helped establish the motorcycle as a symbol of youthful rebellion.

The film also made Fortner a local hero. His ashes now reside in an urn inside Johnny’s. And while customers know that Wino Willie is a goner, they worry that the rally he helped make famous might be history as well.

“It’s a sad day for Hollister,” said bartender Sylvia Combie, serving bottles of Coors and Budweiser to a midday crowd.

The rally’s sponsors have considered moving the event down the road to San Juan Bautista. Councilman Chuck Geiger said he’d gladly take the rally off Hollister’s hands to improve his town’s flagging finances.

But after rally sponsors met with city officials this week, residents got cold feet, including one, according to a story in the Hollister Free Lance, who told the City Council: “I love bikers.... And I think it would be great to sit down and have a pancake breakfast with them. But I don’t know if San Juan can handle much more than that.”

Geiger disagrees. “Those motorcycles are the sound of money,” he said. “Our town is dying. We need commerce. And cyclists spend tons of cash.”

Though Hollister officials say they don’t know how much money the rally pumps into the town’s economy, organizers have said that bikers spend up to $8 million over the holiday weekend.

Hollister’s love-hate relationship with its motorcyclists dates to 1947, when a handful of Boozefighters joined thousands of riders who converged upon the town of 5,000 -- named after Col. W.W. Hollister, who drove the first flock of sheep across the continent.

What happened next has long been debated.

“A biker named Red Dog Dahlgren got put in jail for, depending on who you listen to, either being drunk or riding his bike down the middle of the sidewalk,” said Bill Hayes of Redondo Beach, author of “The Original Wild Ones,” a history of the Boozefighters. “Wino Willie and the others went to bail him out. The media jumped on the story as a would-be jailbreak.”

One newspaper described the events as “the worst 40 hours in the history of Hollister.” The rally produced an iconic photograph, published in Life magazine, showing a menacing, beer-drinking rider atop his Harley.

Hayes says the staged photo helped start the Hollister legend. A 1951 Harper’s magazine story describes a motorcycle gang with its “multitude of pistons and the crackling of exhaust pipes” invading a small California town and running over a young girl.

Then came the Hollywood version, which features an exchange that still reverberates like a Harley-Davidson.

“What are you rebelling against, Johnny?” Brando’s character is asked.

“Whaddaya got?” he sneers.

After the 1947 incident, Hollister suspended the rally until 1996. Since it resumed, police say, each year brought more tension between riders and officers, who often patrolled Hollister’s streets in riot gear.

“The cops over-policed it,” said biker Robert Sanchez, polishing his baby-blue Harley outside a cycle repair shop. “They walked through the town like a Gestapo, just inviting trouble.”

Hall, the county sheriff, said 43 rally-goers were charged with drunk driving in 2005, and there was one cycle-related death. Then there was the standoff between the Mongols and Hells Angels.

“The presence of these gangs is an accident waiting to happen,” he said. “If not for the police presence last year, it would have blown up in all our faces.”

George Christie Jr., a spokesman for the Hells Angels, doubted whether many Angels would show up in Hollister this July 4.

“If there’s not going to be an official event where we’re invited by the community, we don’t see any reason to go up there,” he said.

At Johnny’s, which boasts a life-size image of Brando clad in black leather, owner Charisse Tyson said she has appealed to Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger -- another avid Harley owner. “This rally brings people from around the world,” she said. “Cancel it, and that’s money California will not get.”

Scattini, the city’s mayor, hardly mirrors Brando’s bad-boy image, riding in the rally with his leather-clad teacup poodle, Gigi, on his handlebars. But when it comes to his favorite biker event, he’s prepared to get a little mean.

Scattini is angry over rumors that authorities plan to staff checkpoints July 4 to discourage riders from entering the town. Hall says it isn’t true.

“This city is shooting itself in the foot,” Scattini said. “These cyclists are coming. And without sponsors, we’re going to get stuck with a big bill. And then I’m going to go before the City Council and say, ‘I told you so.’ ”