Opinion: Annual blessing of the bikes in West Dennis is a roaring success
Every first Sunday in May, an old friend (and former fire chief) David Akin dons his white clerical vestments, climbs up atop an enormous fire truck, and slowly makes his way past upwards of a thousand parked motorcycles. From way up there, he dips a big paintbrush into a bucket of water and, as the truck creeps along, showers down a liquid blessing on bikes and owners as he passes.
Except for two years lost to COVID, these biker blessings have unfolded without fail since 1976, and for the last 20 years at West Dennis Beach. It is a perfect location: a parking lot about a mile long, an ocean view and space for vendors of memorabilia, food and drinks.
While the $5 minimum donations go to the Blue Knights Special fund, the revenue has also been shared with the Cancer Research Institute, the Cape Cod Times Needy Fund, the Yarmouth Police Sergeant Sean Gannon Memorial Fund and others.
I’ve been a biker since my college days in the late '60s. I never had the money for a big road machine and besides, bikes with 300cc engines and down have taken me on multi-thousand-mile trips, just like the big boys do. This is a pretty well-kept secret in the industry. Advertisers for the motorcycle magazines are selling mostly high-end stuff for mostly high-end bikes. The idea that the owner of a modestly priced machine can go touring is almost heretical.
Piaggio brothers invent the Vespa
Naturally, it isn’t heretical almost anywhere else in the world where people get around on motor scooters. The scooter’s ancestry goes back to the end of World War II in Italy. The Piaggio brothers made parts for Italian bombers: the little landing wheels at the back of the plane, tiny gas motors used to crank the big bomber engines and some light metalworking.
After the war, Italy’s industrial base was in ruins; the roads were cratered with bomb holes. Jobs were scarce. So the brothers cobbled together a radical design. They’d use the rear wheel assemblies from the planes. They’d use their little gas motors for power and offer a step-through metal body with floorboards that swept up in front to protect the rider from mud and splash. It was such a hit that within a decade, an estimated 1 in 10 Italians were making a living off these things.
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The Piaggio brothers had invented the motor scooter. Given its teardrop bulge in the rear, they called it the "Wasp” — or “Vespa” in Italian.
I rode a modern version of this design to the blessing. It has, in engine capacity, less than 1/10th of what almost everyone else was riding at maybe a 10th of the cost. I estimated around $22 million worth of bikes rolled onto the tarmac at the blessing. My scooter cost me 2,000 bucks, brand new.
The dominant life form last Sunday was the Harley Davidson. These and their rival Indian Motorcycles provided motorcycles for the American war effort in WWII.
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Motorcycles evolved from motorized bicycles. Engines replaced the pedals to drive the chains to power the bikes. Racing, more than daily commuting, drove the competitors to larger and larger engines with continually beefed-up suspensions to handle the added weight.
For a moment, it looked like motorcycles would become America’s dominant form of transportation, but then came the automobile. Both Harley and Indian struggled over the years to survive the influx of Japanese bikes. At one point, Honda owned almost 70% of the American market. But then momentum shifted. The Harley Davidson became an iconic piece of Americana. Indian, for a while defunct, found a new footing and rebounded with excellent new products.
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Rumble down 6A on a nice weekend afternoon and almost every motorcycle you pass will be a Harley. Big touring bikes like these are pricey — but for their owners, it’s not just what you ride; it’s what you are. Ride a Harley and you’re a member of a tribe.
Tribal colors trend to black. Some of the nicest guys look like outlaws rumbling down the road — and a bit of the sense of wild-western independence goes along with it. But don’t be fooled. Last Sunday, over a thousand bikers roared onto West Dennis Beach, took off their helmets and got along just fine. They always do.
How much did the bikers raise? I’m guessing at least $20,000, maybe much more. Rarely can so many people join in raising so much money and have such a good time. And for just a moment, we each bowed our heads and felt a tiny sprinkle of cool water — a blessing we’ll all need in the year ahead.
Lawrence Brown of Centerville is a columnist for the Cape Cod Times. Email him at columnresponse@gmail.com.
This article originally appeared on Cape Cod Times: Cape Cod: Annual blessing of the bikes a mix of comradery, fundraising
