"'Cherryland Vagabonds' long gone but not forgotten in Door county" from the August 28, 1979 Door County Advocate
By JIM ROBERTSON
'Cherryland Vagabonds' long gone but not forgotten in Door county
By JIM ROBERTSON
Cherryland and vagabond are two names which can stir up a feeling of romance in just about any person's soul.
After all, Webster defines a vagabond as an idle wanderer and idle wandering is about as romantic as you can get.
And Cherryland has always triggered an air of romance when people think of Door county, her blossoms and her cherries.
Now put them together and you have the Cherryland Vagabonds, who to many Door county residents 30 or more years ago were public nuisances but to the Vagabonds themselves were not only idle wanderers but the real romanticists of their day.
Well, not really idle wanderers. It took work and cash to buy and run the big luxurious "74s," the chromed, saddle-bagged Indians and Harley-Davidsons of the Vagabonds' day.
Bob Larson and Vern DeLair.
The Cherryland Vagabonds were born on the summer night of June 24, 1948, at Tagge's Tavern on County Trunk S, now the Stage Road Inn. They were a group of motorcyclists who decided a formal organization with a charter from the American Motorcycle Assn. was a way to gain a little respectability for a little respected gang.
It was a gang that had its beginning in the aftermath of World War II with two "Indian" riders, Phil and Joe Peterson, on Shiloh rd. just inside the city limits. Within the next year or two and within a mile and a half stretch on Shiloh rd., they had been joined by three more Indian riders, Doug Trodahl, Bob Hendricks and me plus a couple of Harley men, Glen Anderson and Mel Selvick.
So within a stretch of a mile and a half, there were seven big bikes, a solid nucleus for the Cherryland Vagabonds. They were to be joined by 17 other riders as charter members of the club.
The name Cherryland Vagabonds was suggested by Phil Peterson and unanimously adopted as the name of the club at its first meeting held on that June night 31 years ago. And Phil, being the veteran motorcyclist of the group, was named the first president.
When I asked Phil, now a motorcycle dealer in Mimi, Fla., if he had any old pictures of the group, he not only brought me an album but an old record book showing the original membership list of 24, a list that at one time reached a peak of 46 before the club broke up sometime in 1952 and included such names as Jerry Slavik and Glen Anderson, now city engineer and fire chief in Sturgeon Bay, and Dean Pies. soon to be Kewaunee county judge.
Phil not only came up with the old membership book but Joe came up with the official "Minute Book of the Cherryland Vagabonds Motorcycle Club, Sturgeon Bay, Wis., AMA Charter No. 1386.
Phil Peterson represented the Vagabonds in professional racing.
The club's second meeting held on July 1 dealt primarily with a discussion of emblems the club would order, knitted emblems that could be sewn on the back of the popular black leather jackets of the day and emblems that could be imprinted on T-shirts.
According to the minutes, "The emblem will be made up as follows: The background gray, the letters red, the county white and the cherries natural."
The emblem
Also recorded in the July 1, 1948, minutes was the paragraph, "A trip to Manitowoc the 5th for the races was decided upon. The group will meet in front of Klenke's garage and leave at 10:30 a.m."
Klenke's was actually the west side business of Oscar Klenke and Frank Kohlbeck, two partners the Vagabonds not only bothered incessantly for a quarter or half dollar's worth of gas but for all sorts of minor repairs. An old motorcyclist himself, Oscar is best remembered for his willingness to drop his tools around a car to assist a frustrated cyclist.
In fact, it got to a point where the Klenke-Kohlbeck garage was probably the first self-service station in town as the Vagabonds started filling up their own tanks rather than take Oscar or Frank away from their repair work in back.
Tagge's hall continued as the Vagabonds' meeting place through the third meeting when Doug Trodahl offered a vacant house in his dad's cherry orchard as a clubhouse. It was there at the fourth Meeting on July 15 that members agreed that road formation enroute to races and other events was a problem and that members should draw for riding positions.
Not only was the road captain, Jetty Slavik, in charge of the formation but when it was decided at the fourth meeting to purchase a first aid kit it was also decided that it should be carried by the same road captain. Yes, there were to be times when certain Vagabonds. would require the contents of a first aid kit.
Lined up before a Sunday ride. Left to right, Bob Hendricks, Jim Robertson with his brother Jack behind, Joe Peterson, Bunky Haen and Suzie Jackson, Jerry Slavik, Dean Pies with Don Hendricks behind.
At the July 15 meeting it was also decided to attend the New London hill climb as a group on the 18th and to suspend meetings for the duration of cherry season because the whole Shiloh road gang was involved in the harvest.
The cherry season over, the fifth meeting held Sept. 3 was back at Tagge's where it was decided that the next event would be a tour through northern Door county the following Sunday, with a picnic at Peninsula State Park. And meetings continued at Tagge's until it was decided a permanent clubhouse could be found. And with Vern DeLair working at Jackson Motors, an offer to use the basement of the garage as a clubhouse was accepted, at least during the winter months.
With a new venture into newspapering at Manitowoc awaiting me the first of the year, the club's 11th meeting on Nov. 26 was the last I duly recorded as club secretary, having succeeded Lee Rubens when he resigned on Sept. 30. My last entry in the minute book noted that the Vagabonds would support the American Motorcycling Magazine's drive against open mufflers with all members signing the pledge "The following members of the Cherryland Vagabonds Motorcycle Club hereby agree to equip their motorcycles with standard mufflers—to support wholeheartedly the drive sponsored by the American Motorcycling Magazine against open mufflers."
Just how long the pledge was upheld is open to question because 30 years ago this week the city council instructed the police department and city attorney to conduct a drive against "motorcyclists operating without mufflers or deliberately backfiring or otherwise creating unnecessary noise." But then maybe the offenders were "outlaws"—how could the. Vagabonds do such things?
And to show just how cooperative the Vagabonds were with the law, the club's 12th meeting after the winter months found a new but anonymous secretary recording that both Chief of Police Frank Parkman and Capt. Eldon Carmody were present "to tell us how we could cooperate with them." Chief Parkman suggested we give them a list of all club members so if they are arrested they could send the club and their parents a notice telling them of the arrest. Does something here tell us that Vagabonds did indeed at times get in trouble with the law?
Charter members of the Cherryland Vagabonds.
Not only did the Vagabonds lose members to outside jobs but to cars and marriage. Of the original 24, only Joe and Phil Peterson, Dick Burton and Wayne Schroeder attended the club's last recorded meeting on July 15, 1952. Also present were Ben Logerquist, Don Miller, Dale Younk, Charlie Baum, Earl Philipp, John Wehausen and Bob Jorgenson.
Just to show the Vagabonds weren't male chauvinists, this is Marion Colombo, Joe Peterson's riding companion and now his wife.
And at the risk of omitting some whose names might not have been entered, here's the rest of the 46 members who were listed in the official records of the gone but not forgotten Cherryland Vagabonds Motorcycle Club:
Eugene Jacobs, Allen Fortemps, Jerry Larson, Jim Johnson, Floyd Osgood, Andy Lawrence, John Oberg. Karl Stegmann (honorary), John Collins, Reg Dart, Jim Mineau, Dan Weber, Jim Blish, Krist Olson, John Prange and Don Greaves.
Joke as we might about the old Vagabonds being hellions on wheels, not a single fatality or serious injury was ever recorded among club members. That's quite a record although as more than one honest Vagabond will agree, we had more luck than sense.
Vagabonds at Lancaster. Left to right, Dean Pies, Joe Peterson, Allen Fortemps (kneeling); Dick Burton, Lloyd Lautenbach and Jerry Larson.
Courtesy of the Door County Library Newspaper Archive
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