Fifty years ago today, October 27, 1968......

[Paul Danik]

Greetings,

    On October 27th. 1968 John Penton promoted an Inter-Am event at New Philadelphia, Ohio, hard to believe that was 50 years ago today ! The event took place on the Hugo Mathias farm and was absolutely incredible, as anyone who was in attendance will surely attest to.

   I was fortunate enough to be there as a spectator and to this very day the memories from that event are still very vivid in my mind. You would think that John Penton would have been so overwhelmed with the introduction that very same year of his namesake motorcycle that he would not even consider such a monumental undertaking, but that was not the case.

   I was in New Philadelphia the other evening and called Matt Weisman while on the road to discuss the event and some the specifics of it. Matt instantly told of how he and Barb stayed at the same hotel as some of the top European riders and what an interesting and somewhat crazy time it was. Matt worked on the promotion of that event as well as creating the official event program which I fortunately have a copy of, apparently paying the grand sum of 50 cents to obtain !

   Tom Penton once commented that his arms are still sore from pounding metal posts in the ground to hold up the snow fence that held back the spectators.  

Paul

[skiracer]

Thanks for sharing Paul!

1976 MC 5 Original Owner
1976 Penton 175 XC

[t20sl]

Paul:  I was 14 and helped at the event.  I remember riding a Honda CT90 around the track once.  The Enduro Riders Assn which put on the Little Burr 250 national enduro got enlisted to help as flaggers.  I still have the yellow-orangeish/white arm band that we wore which denoted a couse worker.  The europeans made those off camber turns look like a high banked speedway.
Ted

[hanksie]

Paul,That was the one event that's still brought up around these parts.Awesome is the best I can do.Did Matt mention the name of the motel,as there wasn't that many around here back then.   Bill