Monsters Of The Salt

So imagine you’re an American living in Paris. Imagine you love motorcycles and anything really that goes fast. OK, not too hard so far. Now, imagine there in Paris France, at a vintage motorcycle show, you see a crowd gathered around an old Triumph and somewhere from the middle of the crowd you hear someone shout: “C’est le monster du lac salé!”

This is the amazing story of the Monster of the Salt and much like onions and Ogre’s, this story has many, many layers. This one is a Life Loom story of sorts where one man, whether he liked it or not, was destined to bring the others together. It’s one of those occurrences that happen in life that simply seem to have chosen you.

Monsters of the Salt Poster

One cannot ignore these moments, and moto-journalist Mark Gardiner has certainly not. Mark is an author who created a blog called BikeWriter and you can read the whole crazy story at: http://backmarker-bikewriter.blogspot.com/2011/02/best-of-backmarker-monsters-of-salt.html

He’s now trying to raise enough money to make a documentary of the men and the machines that bind them and had teamed up with Producer Thomas Guttry and Director Kevin Ward on Indiegogo.

Here is the Monsters of the Salt trailer:

It’s hard to tell which layer is the most interesting; is it that a French motorcycle builder built a bike from just a picture in a French comic book about American culture in the 60’s? Is it that the comic book artist drew the picture from a 1967 magazine and was actually able to find it in his studio, nearly 40 years later? Or is it that the guy who was in the original photo, Nira Johnson, now eighty years old, was one of the first African/American drag racers of his time. Maybe it’s that the original bike was actually just recently located, still in storage with the original Bonneville tech inspection stickers still on it.

This was the photo that Sire used for inspiration. That’s ’60s drag ace Nira Johnson, on the bike.

Nira Johnson, at MMP in 2008, with his bike (now in the collection of Rodd Lighthouse.)

There seems to be so much more to this story that it just has to be told.

Probably like you, I just can’t seem to get enough good speed/motorcycle art in my life, whether film, photo, painting, story, whatever. I’ve probably seen Burt Monroe and The World’s Fastest Indian two dozen times now and it never grows old.

So, c’mon My Life at SPEED-ers – make an offering to the gods of SPEED! Let’s help these guys get this film made. It’s the right thing to do. Well shucks Wally, it’s the American thing to do!

Ray Roske

Back in last-century grade school, Ray Roske was sent to detention and wrote a satirical story for a substitute English teacher about an imaginary Polish motocross star named Haluska Palushka for his punishment. He did so assuming he'd get suspended and earn a free pass home for the day. Instead, he was brought before the class as a model student and falsely accused of being an example of both repentance and fine creative writing. Years later, in a millenium contest sponsored by the Washington Post, he again fooled everyone by writing one hundred words about a bowling trophy and earned top spot in the January 1, 2000 editio. Again, he was told by a Post editor that he was a writer. Since that time he has kept his head down, selling software he's never used in an industry hes never worked, writing occasionally for Open Salon and Examiner.com. He's hoping no one figures out that he really he has no idea what he's doing. An opportunity to contribute to My Life @ Speed began with unexpected 2012 PPIHC press credentials from Examiner.com, a borrowed Ducati Multistrada and an unlikely introduction and phone call from Greg Tracy. Hopefully they're all too busy here to notice.