POG display at Mid-Ohio

[Paul Danik]

With your help, on Saturday July 26th the Super Pavilion at Mid-Ohio Sportscar Course will be transformed into PENTONVILLE. Just as the DeLorean in "Back to the future" could take Marty and the professor to a different era, all of the gathered Penton related motorcycles, memorabilia, and most importantly folks with a love of John Penton in the Mid-Ohio PENTONVILLE, will surely take our hearts and minds back to the era of the Penton Sportcycle.

Last Thursday, a few of us visited Mid-Ohio to check out the Super Pavilion and the area around it in anticipation of transforming the area into Pentonville. As the photo attests to, the Super Pavilion is quite large, I believe 40 foot by 300 foot. The roof should provide either shade or rain protection for the day, or possibly both. The paved floor will provide a solid base for displaying the many motorcycles that will be on hand. As mentioned before, all Penton related cycles are welcome, and they need not be complete. Everything from bare frames, fresh barn finds, racers, restorations and survivors in any and all conditions are more than welcome.

We hope to have handlebar tags available that can be filled out to provide any information the owner may wish to provide. If your motorcycle requires a crate or stand of any sort please be sure to bring it along. We will be setting aside an area for memorabilia of any sort that you may wish to display. Again, if you need a table or any sort of props for your display, please bring those items along.

We are looking to rent some tables and chairs, but they are for folks to be able to sit at and relax a bit or possibly eat their lunch bought from the nearby food vendors.

We plan to decorate Pentonville with numerous banners and create a welcoming display that will do justice to John Penton and his upcoming 100th birthday.

As we stood in the area of the Super Pavillion last Thursday, my mind went back 25 years to when the Penton Sportcycles were the Featured Marque at VMD and John Penton was the Grand Marshall, at that time a large tent was erected in the exact spot where the Super Pavilion now stands to house our display. Even after 25 years, I could still feel the excitement of that day. Dane Leimbach, Carl Cranke, Al Born, Ollie Martin, Doug Wilford, Dave Mungenast and many more folks who are no longer with us were smiling and in their glory as we all celebrated John Penton and his Penton Sportcycles. My hope for each and every one of you is that you can be a part of the resurrection of Pentonville on Saturday July 26th and that you can feel the excitement and love for all things Penton that will surely be in the air. Come one come all !