Photo courtesy Harley-Davidson
Mama Tried motorcycle show 2023
You don’t see many motorcycles on Milwaukee streets in winter. The icy climate is the obvious reason. With an eye toward filling that downtime, in February 2014 Warren Heir Jr. and Scott Johnson organized the first Mama Tried, an invitational for custom motorcycles—from choppers to racing bikes—that has become an annual weekend-long event drawing enthusiasts from around the world. Mama Tried’s partner event, Flat-out Friday, is an opportunity to race the bikes indoors, safe from all that ice and slush.
On Saturday, June 17, the Harley-Davidson Museum opens its first major new exhibition since COVID: “Mama Tried: Bringing It Together.” The 13 motorcycles on display, 12 of them Harleys, are “an eclectic selection of everything and everyone,” says David Kreidler, the museum’s exhibits curator. When held in recent years at the Eagles Ballroom, Mama Tried has included as many as 100 motorcycles plus vendors. “We’re not trying to recreate the event but introduce the event,” Kreidler explains.
The museum’s curated cross-section of a typical Mama Tried, like the February showcase itself, “is more than a bunch of motorcycles in a room,” Kreidler continues. “Mama Tried isn’t just about getting the best builders in the world, but also about interesting people with something to say with their motorcycles.”
|
|
“Bringing It Together” juxtaposes those “best builders” with exemplary Midwesterners, including familiar faces on our city’s streets in summer. Representing world famous is Shinya Kimura’s 1946 Knucklehead reimagined into a twisting mass of machinery recalling illustrations from the old Heavy Metal magazine. From Milwaukee, check out Freddie Franklin’s Electra Glide, a shiny black chrome-wrapped tribute to ‘70s Blaxploitation movies. The venerable Willie G. Davidson contributes his own customized Harley, a motorized Old West model with hand-stitched leather saddlebag and antlers. “He set the tone for Harley-Davidson’s relationship with the custom world,” Kreidler says, describing the motor baron’s rides to Sturges where he solicited opinions from other riders.
“It’s pretty exciting to be part of this,” says Mama Tried cofounder Scott Johnson. “Warren and I are Harley-Davidson enthusiasts—fans of the brand. That it’s a hometown company means a lot to us, but they’d be our favorite even if they weren’t located in Milwaukee.” On the origins of Mama Tried, Johnson says, “We were just putting together a show of our friends’ bikes. We wanted to put that craft on display. And February in Wisconsin? It’s when people repaint, change the gas tank, put new tires on. Winter is a good time for people to get inspiration.”
“Mama Tried: Bringing It Together” runs through January 2025.
