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 RIP Sonny Barger, a true American icon
Sonny Barger, biker outlaw and founder of Hells Angels, dies at 83. For decades, he was the public face of a nationwide counterculture tribe of bearded, denim-clad road warriors memorialized in literature and film. Sonny Barger, the bigger-than-life godfather of the Hells Angels Motorcycle Club, equal parts brawler, bully, braggart, rule breaker and shrewd huckster of his own outlaw mystique, died June 29 at his home in Livermore, Calif. He was 83. A statement on his official Facebook page read: “If you are reading this message, you’ll know that I’m gone. I’ve asked that this note be posted immediately after my passing.” His former lawyer, Fritz Clapp, confirmed the death and said the cause was liver cancer.
For decades, the stocky, muscular Mr. Barger stood not only as the founder of the original Oakland, Calif., Angels chapter in 1957, but for decades after that also as the public face of a nationwide counterculture tribe of bearded, denim-clad road warriors memorialized in literature and film — roaring down the open highway and through crossroads towns, shocking the locals with their boisterous, often menacing presence.
It was a rowdy, frequently lawless brotherhood bound, in no particular order, by machismo, tattoos, winged death-head insignia, booze, dope, rides to nowhere on thundering Harley-Davidson hogs and a lust for the unfettered freedom found on the open road. “Discover your limits by exceeding them,” Mr. Barger urged.
Woven into the Hells Angels history was a tradition of crime and violence — much of it involving Mr. Barger, a fact he boastfully acknowledged. He once referred to himself as belonging to a band of “card-carrying felons.” He was convicted in 1988 of conspiracy to kill members of a rival club in Kentucky and blow up their headquarters, serving five years in federal prison. A confessed cocaine addict who supported his habit by selling heroin in the 1960s and 1970s, he served stints totaling eight years for assorted drug and firearms charges.
The Hells Angels — as a corporate entity with chapters from California to New York — faced incessant federal investigation on criminal enterprise and racketeering offenses. In 2013, authorities obtained convictions against 16 members and hangers-on in South Carolina for a conspiracy involving drug distribution, gun*running, money laundering and arson.
Most infamous in Hells Angles lore was their role in the chaotic 1969 Rolling Stones concert at Altamont, Calif., where a pistol-wielding 18-year-old concertgoer, Meredith Hunter, was stabbed to death by a Hells Angel — all captured on film in the 1970 documentary “Gimme Shelter.” The Angels, hired to provide security, were fighting off fans rushing the stage, according to Mr. Barger, who was present. The drug-fueled crowd pressed against the Angels’ security line, damaging some of their bikes, and Angels waded into the crowd swinging fists and cue sticks.
In his autobiography “Hell’s Angel — The Life and Times of Sonny Barger and the Hell’s Angels Motorcycle Club,” Mr. Barger accused Stones guitarist Keith Richards of delaying the band’s performance to work up the crowd. He claimed that he pressed a pistol to Richards’s ribs and ordered him to start playing immediately. Richards complied, but the crowd, including Hunter, kept swarming toward the stage, according to Mr. Barger. Hunter fired a single shot, winging a Hells Angel, Mr. Barger said. Other Angels quickly subdued Hunter, punching and kicking him. One Angel was charged with fatally stabbing him but was acquitted after claiming self-defense.
Over the years, Mr. Barger served as a technical consultant for biker movies and appeared in several, including “Hells Angels on Wheels” (1967), a low-budget exploitation film featuring Jack Nicholson. For the real-life Hells Angels Motorcycle Club, he drew inspiration from an earlier movie — the 1953 classic “The Wild One,” with Marlon Brando playing a strangely sensitive gang leader. Mr. Barger preferred Lee Marvin’s more aggressive performance as a biker.
Mr. Barger’s rough and anarchic manner belied a disciplined entrepreneurial streak. He promoted his renegade brand, carefully marketing Hells Angels-themed T-shirts, yo-yos, sunglasses and California wines. He registered trademarks on club logos and designs, and retained an intellectual property rights lawyer to sue poachers, a frequent occurrence.
To give the Angels a little gloss, he initiated periodic charity drives for children’s toys and clothes. “He’s smart and he’s crafty, and he has a kind of wild animal cunning,” author Hunter S. Thompson told The Washington Post in 2000. Thompson spent a year with the Angels researching his seminal book “Hell’s Angels: A Strange and Terrible Saga” (1966).
He hated school and was repeatedly suspended for mouthing off and occasionally hitting his teacher. “I never liked being told what to do,” he said.
For a time, he came under the care of his paternal grandmother, a strict Pentecostalist. In quick order, he rejected what he called the “tongue-yammering Holy Rollers,” smoked his first marijuana cigarette at 14, dropped out of high school at 16 and joined the Army with a forged birth certificate.
Fourteen months later, military authorities discovered the subterfuge and ousted him. Back home, he drifted from job to job — janitor, pipe threader, potato chip assembly-line worker. “I couldn’t get a grip on this nine-to-five working stuff,” he wrote.
He joined his first biker group, the Oakland Panthers, in 1956 and formed the Hells Angels Motorcycle Club in Oakland the next year. “I needed a close-knit club of men who could jump on their bikes, ride cross-country if they wanted to, and not abide by rules or clocks,” he said.
Over the next several decades, he grew his single club into a financially sustainable network with thousands of members in the United States, Canada, Europe and elsewhere. Despite its many run-ins with the law, the organization was fundamentally successful — an all-male, virtually all-White, dues-paying fraternal order with a brisk retail trade in club paraphernalia.
Mr. Barger published two novels, “Dead in 5 Heartbeats” (2003) and “6 Chambers, 1 Bullet” (2006), detailing murder and mayhem in the biker world. His epithet-strewn autobiography was a New York Times bestseller, and two other books, “Freedom: Credos From the Road” (2005) and “Ridin’ High, Livin’ Free” (2002), received positive reviews. Some were co-written with writers Keith and Kent Zimmerman. He co-authored a sixth book, “Let’s Ride: Sonny Barger’s Guide to Motorcycling” (2010), with writer Darwin Holmstrom.
In 1982, he was diagnosed with throat cancer — he had smoked three packs of Camels a day for 30 years — and had his vocal cords removed. He learned to speak through a surgically inserted hole in his throat, giving his voice an eerie rasp.
In 1998, he moved from Oakland to suburban Phoenix, dropping his official duties in the Hells Angels but remaining a rank-and-file member. He ran a motorcycle repair shop and mellowed in suburban life, doing yoga and continuing to lift weights, a pastime he acquired in prison. He kept riding the open road, thousands of miles a year, eventually professing a preference for high-powered Hondas and BMWs to the Angels’ traditional Harley choppers.
What did his nonconformist life teach him? “To become a real man,” he counseled in his autobiography, “you need to join the army first and then do some time in jail.”
Last edited by UtahPete; 07-01-2022 at 06:41 PM.
Reason: brevity
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I met him once at the 4th celebration held at Corbin Saddles. There were several "clubs" there, all behaving themselves with respect to Mike Corbin.
Mr. Barger was in the showroom, hocking his latest book "Dead in 14 Seconds" (I think that was the title), flanked by his very large body guards, signing autographs. After two hours of this (I was answering questions about my Smuggler/Seat on my Goldwing on display), I had noticed that no one had brought him anything to eat or drink.
Being the small female that I am (and retired Marine), I walked over to introduce myself and offer to get him something. He was a complete gentleman. His goons needed to be a little more attentive, because he was no spring chicken.
Please don't spook the road-sheep.
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He and his daughter lived across the street from my grandparents. I'd play with his daughter when I went to visit them... until I met him. Wasn't too fond of non whites at the time so we stopped being friends. Sad really...
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 Originally Posted by Pirate
He and his daughter lived across the street from my grandparents. I'd play with his daughter when I went to visit them... until I met him. Wasn't too fond of non whites at the time so we stopped being friends. Sad really...
Sorry to hear that.
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Just a small scale version of the powers that be really.
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Originally Posted by ARtraveler
Tick...tick...tick
It looks like we are getting close to closing. Not wishing to get into a discussion about the good and bad points about people with bad reputations. 
You can close it. I wasn't expecting to get such strong reactions.
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.... as a former LEO, I just can't RIP someone like that ..... JMHO .... Mike
