About a year ago Big Scott of the Cycle Zombies sent me the following email:
"Hey Chris,
I just picked up a 1965 XLCH... the guy I bought it from said he was the 2nd owner, the original owner was a actor and used the bike in a lot of 'B' Biker Flicks? I think he went by the name of Snake, or Spider? probably Snake since that was the theme of the bike. Anyway you might recognize it or maybe know some history about it. Also on the motor it is stamped Sy Gray maybe his real name? Check out the pics on our blog and let me know your thoughts. Thanks, Scott"
One of the pics from the Cycle Zombies Blog April 2009. Hard to see in this shot, but it has snake scales painted on it's molded frame.
I didn't recognize the bike and told him the only guy called Spider (who rode a Sportster), I knew of was this Stunt Man from the late sixties.
One thought I had was, Since the bike and dude was in several movies, could the original owner have been a pal of Gary Littlejohn?
I just picked up a 1965 XLCH... the guy I bought it from said he was the 2nd owner, the original owner was a actor and used the bike in a lot of 'B' Biker Flicks? I think he went by the name of Snake, or Spider? probably Snake since that was the theme of the bike. Anyway you might recognize it or maybe know some history about it. Also on the motor it is stamped Sy Gray maybe his real name? Check out the pics on our blog and let me know your thoughts. Thanks, Scott"
One of the pics from the Cycle Zombies Blog April 2009. Hard to see in this shot, but it has snake scales painted on it's molded frame.
I didn't recognize the bike and told him the only guy called Spider (who rode a Sportster), I knew of was this Stunt Man from the late sixties.
One thought I had was, Since the bike and dude was in several movies, could the original owner have been a pal of Gary Littlejohn?
Then this and another photo of the bike were recently posted on the ZZ Chop blog saying it's now gone to Japan.
The weird part is, seeing it again, triggered the memory of where I had seen it. It was in the June 1996 25th Anniversary issue of Easyriders as one of the Staff Rides. Easyriders did have staff members called Snake and Spider, but since they made up lots of pen names to make the staff seem larger, there might not be a connection to the original owner/builder
This article was a typical Easyriders fanciful uninformative bull-shitty history of the bike. Big Scott's photos show the tags on the license plate as being last registered in 1986 and this photo was in the June 1996 issue. So the dude in the photo, Clay Dog (if that's his real name), might not be much of a rider or truly one of the bike's owners. It could be just a posed shot for that issue, since they were featuring the staff and their bikes.
One other funny/strange thing. When I first saw this photo in ER, I thought it would be cool to see more and better shots of the bike.
