I live in Madison Wisconsin but I work out of a small town about 15 minute from here called Cambridge. My folks live there in a 100 year old church that we renovated into there home. It's one of the nicest buildings I've seen if I do say so myself! My Pop and I are general carpenters(which means that we can do about anything) and as I said we work out of Cambridge. There are about 1200 people in town but a lot of people from Illinois own cottages on the lake in town called Lake Ripley so there is always work for us around town.
Anyway, I went to the Subway restaurant for lunch today. I got my lunch and a paper and not three minutes after I sat down an old timer walked up to me and asked if that was my Harley parked outside(funny how you can always pick out the riders!) and I told him it was. I was expecting to hear a nice bike! or some story about the bike he used to have, but no, he went on to tell me something entirely different.
This is what he told me:
The Davidson family(of Harley-Davidson) owned a cottage on Lake Ripley. They would come from Milwaukee(probably an hour and a half from Cambridge to Milwaukee in those days) and have a little R&R. When the second generation(I'm calling the sons of the original Davidson brothers that started HD the second generation) grew and started coming to Cambridge on there own, the old timer that told me this story was around 12 years old. He would walk along the shore and sneak around the fence that divided the Davidson land from the local bible camp and go into their boat house where there sat a Cris-Craft boat. The boat house was never locked so whenever he felt like drooling he could sneak in and look at this boat.
Anyway, when second generation Davidson boys were still quite young, the family became friends with a local guy named Ole Evinrude. Even though the Davidsons were quite well off and Ole was poor they were all good friends. Ole used to row his boat across the lake with his girlfriend. Being a friend of the Dividsons paid off because he got a motor from them and stuck it on his boat with some sort of prop so he wouldn't have to row all over the lake. It worked so well he decided to start a business doing this and thus became the first boat motor and Evinrude Motors.
This is the shortened version of what he told me. He thinks the boat house is still there so I'm going to do a little snooping myself and see. It might be the same house too. He went on to tell me more history of Cambridge but it's not as interesting.
Cambridge is also the home town of Nascar driver Matt Kenseth. I'm not a Nascar fan but it's neat to go by his house every day. Matt built a fan club for the town because they were using one part of a little strip mall and it had grown too small. It's neat to see all of his old cars from when he was racing at the local Jefferson Speedway and the other local tracks. There is also one of his Nascar cars there and his old suits and ALL of his trophies from highscool racing through today. Although he has others, HD gave him a bike for being a big part of Wisconsin and that bike sits on the floor at his fan club. Matt is a big time HD fan so he's cool in my book. Matt's wife is also from Cambridge and used to work at the local hardware store with an fellow that still works there. From what he tells me she is the stereotypical blond! She woked there for months before she realized the the nuts and blots were aranged from smallest to biggest!
So that's your history lesson for today. There WILL be a test on Friday so study up!
Anyway, I went to the Subway restaurant for lunch today. I got my lunch and a paper and not three minutes after I sat down an old timer walked up to me and asked if that was my Harley parked outside(funny how you can always pick out the riders!) and I told him it was. I was expecting to hear a nice bike! or some story about the bike he used to have, but no, he went on to tell me something entirely different.
This is what he told me:
The Davidson family(of Harley-Davidson) owned a cottage on Lake Ripley. They would come from Milwaukee(probably an hour and a half from Cambridge to Milwaukee in those days) and have a little R&R. When the second generation(I'm calling the sons of the original Davidson brothers that started HD the second generation) grew and started coming to Cambridge on there own, the old timer that told me this story was around 12 years old. He would walk along the shore and sneak around the fence that divided the Davidson land from the local bible camp and go into their boat house where there sat a Cris-Craft boat. The boat house was never locked so whenever he felt like drooling he could sneak in and look at this boat.
Anyway, when second generation Davidson boys were still quite young, the family became friends with a local guy named Ole Evinrude. Even though the Davidsons were quite well off and Ole was poor they were all good friends. Ole used to row his boat across the lake with his girlfriend. Being a friend of the Dividsons paid off because he got a motor from them and stuck it on his boat with some sort of prop so he wouldn't have to row all over the lake. It worked so well he decided to start a business doing this and thus became the first boat motor and Evinrude Motors.
This is the shortened version of what he told me. He thinks the boat house is still there so I'm going to do a little snooping myself and see. It might be the same house too. He went on to tell me more history of Cambridge but it's not as interesting.
Cambridge is also the home town of Nascar driver Matt Kenseth. I'm not a Nascar fan but it's neat to go by his house every day. Matt built a fan club for the town because they were using one part of a little strip mall and it had grown too small. It's neat to see all of his old cars from when he was racing at the local Jefferson Speedway and the other local tracks. There is also one of his Nascar cars there and his old suits and ALL of his trophies from highscool racing through today. Although he has others, HD gave him a bike for being a big part of Wisconsin and that bike sits on the floor at his fan club. Matt is a big time HD fan so he's cool in my book. Matt's wife is also from Cambridge and used to work at the local hardware store with an fellow that still works there. From what he tells me she is the stereotypical blond! She woked there for months before she realized the the nuts and blots were aranged from smallest to biggest!
So that's your history lesson for today. There WILL be a test on Friday so study up!
