Bikers meet in the Quad Cities

Hundreds of bikers converged on the Quad Cities this weekend, for an annual motorcycling event called Sturgis on the River.” The tenth annual gathering featured food, music by forty bands, and three days and nights of riding, camping and celebrating two-wheelers. Rider Rusty Harmening was there with a local chapter of the group Women on Wheels. They had a booth and did recruiting as always, and this year had “goldfish races,” a fundraiser with money donated to a battered women’s shelter. The Quad Cities “River Riders” chapter of Women on Wheels has been a part of the “Sturgis on the river” event for several years now. Rusty calls it a growing event that’s been getting bigger every year, and the women ion wheels have been part of it since the second year. This was the tenth year for “Sturgis on the River.” The town of Sturgis, South Dakota, housed the national motorcycle museum until a few years ago when financial woes forced it to move — to Anamosa, Iowa. Marketing director Nancy Keedy at the National Motorcycle Museum says it came about in the year 2000.She says it “just wasn’t quite making it” in Sturgis, with visitors only two weeks a year during that rally, so one of the board members, who was from Anamosa, suggested moving it to Iowa. The national Motorcycle Museum and Hall of Fame has thrived, with a big 2-story building and nearly 20-thousand visitors a year. Which came first, the car or the motorcycle? Keedy notes that last year was the 100th anniversary of Ford Motor Company.Last year was also the 100th anniversary of Harley-Davidson, and would have been about the hundredth for American-made Indian cycles if that company were still in business. She notes that bicycles came before cars, and early motorcycles were basically built on the frame of a bicycle. For more on the annual gathering in Davenport see www.sturgisontheriver.com and for the motorcycle museum see their website at www.nationalmcmuseum.com