Abbreviation | JMA |
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Founded | 2004 |
Founder | Ken Shapiro (inactive) and Scott Wynn |
Purpose | Motorcycle club umbrella group |
Region | Worldwide |
Membership | 2,500 |
President | Steven Aresty |
Key people | Daniel Herbst (VP), Lauren Secular (Treasurer), Jay Mandelker (Secretary), Bob Cohen (Previous President), Ken Bell (R2R liaison), Ris Gilad (Programming), Jake Simon (Communications) |
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Jews and Judaism |
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Jewish Motorcyclists Alliance (JMA) is an umbrella organization of Jewish motorcycle clubs. The JMA's affiliate clubs consist of independent motorcycle riding clubs with JMA membership criteria. [1] A member club designates a representative to serve on the JMA Council.
The JMA is the home of Jewish motorcyclists from around the world. The JMA is an association of Jewish motorcycle clubs that upon its formation included organized groups in the United States, Canada, Israel, England and Australia, representing over 2,500 Jewish motorcycle enthusiasts. The common thread is the religion; however membership or admittance to the member clubs is not dictated by faith or brand of motorcycle: riders of any denomination or brand of bike are welcome.
A meeting was set up by King Ken of the Semites On Bikes and Scott Wynn of the Chai Riders. The original meeting took place at Mike's Famous Harley Davidson in Delaware on October 3, 2004. Several bike clubs attended the meeting which had a total of 69 bikes and about 100 people. Although it was planned as just a "Meet and Greet", from that meeting grew the concept of the first Ride to Remember, honoring the anniversary of the freedom from the death camps in Europe. The Ride to Remember took place in Washington, DC, in May 2005 under the auspices of the newly named Jewish Motorcyclists Alliance (JMA). Five of the six original clubs were the founding members of the JMA. The founding member clubs were Chai Riders, Hillel's Angels, King David Bikers, Tribe (Washington D.C.), and Yidden On Wheels.
At that time, JMA had a name and people got together under the label, but there was no formal organization. During the early part of 2006, six new clubs joined the original five, with the addition of Tribe MC (Seattle) The Sabra Riders (Atlanta), The Chai Riders (Detroit), The Chaiway Riders (Chicago), Or Tikva (Chicago), and YOW (Australia). The JMA also became formally organized: a Charter & By-laws were instituted so that conduct of JMA business for current and future members would be guided by rules. To date, there are 44 registered clubs affiliated with the JMA and several more in the planning stage.
The Ride to Remember (R2R) has become the de facto defining event for the JMA and will occur annually at a venue to be selected by the JMA’s governing council. In addition to the Ride to Remember, get togethers known as "Meet and Greets" are often held throughout the year and sponsored by host clubs.
R2R 2006 was held in Whitwell, TN, to honor the staff and students of its middle school for their efforts in the Paper Clips Project. R2R 2007 was held in New York City in May 2007. In May 2008, the Jewish Motorcyclists Alliance rode its motorcycles to Omaha, Nebraska for the "Illuminating the Past to Protect the Future" event in support of the Heartland Holocaust Education Fund (HHEF). 2009 R2R enjoyed 215 attendees who, through their collective efforts, raised $57,000 for the Holocaust Research and Lending Library in Savannah and The Remember Project in Charleston. The 2010 Ride to Remember took place in Chicago/Skokie on June 10–13 and followed the route of the Skokie Nazi March 1977, ending at the Illinois Holocaust Museum. Several different JMA affiliated bike clubs have hosted the annual Ride 2 Remember. So far those cities are:
"As individuals, we share the fundamental passion to ride motorcycles, but we are drawn to each of our own clubs by our common faith and heritage as members of the Jewish faith.
The common thread is our religion, regardless of the degree and manner in which we choose to observe the Jewish faith. The admission of a prospective club for membership into the JMA is not predicated upon the degree to which the members of a Jewish club observe or practices the Jewish faith, or by the brands of motorcycles that its members may ride."
The mission of the Jewish Motorcyclists Alliance, and by extension the forum is to create a global internet environment whereby members of the Jewish faith who ride motorcycles can congregate to share and exchange ideas and opinions about matters of concern to the Jewish community at large, as well as issues specifically concerning motorcycles and motorcycle riding.
The Outlaws Motorcycle Club, incorporated as the American Outlaws Association or its acronym, A.O.A., is an international outlaw motorcycle club. Founded in McCook, Illinois in 1935, the Outlaws MC is the oldest outlaw biker club in the world. With 275 chapters located in 23 countries, and a membership of over 3,000, the club is also the third-largest in the world, behind the Hells Angels and the Bandidos.
The American Motorcyclist Association (AMA) is an American nonprofit organization of more than 200,000 motorcyclists that organizes numerous motorcycling activities and campaigns for motorcyclists' legal rights. Its mission statement is "to promote the motorcycling lifestyle and protect the future of motorcycling." The organization was founded in 1924 and as of October 2016 had more than 1,100 chartered clubs.
A motorcycle club is a group of individuals whose primary interest and activities involve motorcycles. A motorcycle group can range as clubbed groups of different bikes or bikers who own same model of vehicle like the Harley Owners Group.
An outlaw motorcycle club, known colloquially as a biker gang or motorcycle gang, is a motorcycle subculture generally centered on the use of cruiser motorcycles, particularly Harley-Davidsons and choppers, and a set of ideals that purport to celebrate freedom, nonconformity to mainstream culture, and loyalty to the biker group.
The six main types of motorcycles are generally recognized as standard, cruiser, touring, sports, off-road, and dual-purpose. Sport touring is sometimes recognized as a seventh category or integrated with the touring category.
The National Association for Bikers with a Disability (NABD) is a Registered Charity in the United Kingdom and in Scotland. The NABD gives technical advice and financial grants to help to adapt motorcycles, sidecars and trikes for use by disabled riders. It also gives advice on training and rider assessments. It owns a fleet of learner-legal motorcycles adapted for various disabilities, which it loans free of charge for training and tests.
State motorcyclists' rights organizations (SMROs) exist in about 32 US states, 25 of which call themselves "ABATE of ," the rest going by various other names. SMROs advocate for a point of view in motorcycling that is, in general, opposed to mandatory helmet laws, required motorcycle safety inspections, mandatory rider training and licensing, and other similar regulation. Instead SMROs favor optional or voluntary motorcycle rider safety education, training, and licensing, and greater public awareness of motorcyclist safety issues. They also favor stronger penalties for car driver infractions such as right of way violations, or when drivers are at fault in accidents that harm motorcycle riders. SMRO activities include lobbying legislatures, letter writing campaigns, and paying for public service announcements and political advertisements. To carry out lobbying at the national level, a coalition of SMRO's created the Motorcycle Riders Foundation (MRF) to lobby in Washington DC. The SMROs and MRF are often allied with the American Motorcyclist Association (AMA) on legislative issues.
The Paper Clips Project, by middle school students from the small southeastern Tennessee town of Whitwell, created a monument for the Holocaust victims of Nazi Germany. It started in 1998 as a simple 8th-grade project to study other cultures, and then evolved into one gaining worldwide attention. At last count, over 30 million paper clips had been received.
Laconia Motorcycle Week is an annual motorcycle rally held in Laconia, New Hampshire, United States. The rally originated as a motorcycle Gypsy tour in 1916 as, the New Hampshire Lakes Region became a popular riding destination for early motorcycle enthusiasts from New York, Boston, Philadelphia and Montreal. The popularity of the rally led to the formation of the Loudon Classic motorcycle race in 1934 which, became one of the most prestigious races in American motorcycle racing, second only to the Daytona 200. The scheduled events included races, shows and a motorcycle hill climb competition. The rally traditionally takes place over nine days in June, always the 2nd and 3rd full weekend. The rally was the largest annual gathering of North American motorcyclists until it was overtaken by the Sturgis Motorcycle Rally during the 1970s.
A motorcycle rally is a gathering of motorcycle enthusiasts. Rallies can be large or small, and one-time or recurring. Some rallies are ride-in events, whereas some like the Iron Butt Rally involve days of riding and an actual gathering only at the end of the ride.
The British Motorcyclists Federation (BMF) is a motorcycle riders' rights group in the United Kingdom. The BMF was founded in 1960 as the Federation of National One Make Motorcycle Clubs to counter accusations of "leather-jacketed hooligans". It renamed itself the BMF in 1965. The group lobbies for motorcyclists' interests at local, national and European levels.
Motorcycle hooliganism includes street racing, street stunting, and games of tag on public roads, or simply cruising, often in very large numbers, against local ordinances.
Black Bike Week, also called Atlantic Beach Bikefest, Black Bikers Week, and The Black Pearl Cultural Heritage and Bike Festival, is an annual motorcycle rally in the Myrtle Beach, South Carolina area, held on Memorial Day weekend. Called a "one-of-a-kind event" and "an exhibitionist's paradise" by Jeffrey Gettleman, Black Bike Week is "all about riding, styling and profiling," in the words of Mayor Irene Armstrong of Atlantic Beach, South Carolina.
The following outline is provided as an overview of motorcycles and motorcycling:
Motor Maids is a women's motorcycle club in North America with over 1,300 members from the United States and Canada. Established in 1940, Motor Maids was one of the first women's motorcycle groups and has been called the oldest existing women's club in the United States. The first president of Motor Maids was Dot Robinson, who held the position for 25 years.
The National Bikers Roundup is the largest camping motorcycle rally in the United States and is organized by a group of African American motorcycle clubs. Its location changes every year but every decade it returns to its founding city of Kansas City, Missouri. More than 1,000 motorcycle clubs attend the event and black women make up close to half of participants.
The Buffalo Soldiers Motorcycle Club (NABSMC) is a Black (African-American) motorcycle club in the United States, named for the historic African-American United States Army regiments known as Buffalo Soldiers, seen in their patch. It is one of the biggest Black motorcycle clubs in the US and the biggest African American motorcycle club in Chicago, with 140+ chapters as of 2019, with over 5000 members across the USA.
This is a glossary of motorcycling terms.
The Harley-Davidson KR or KR750 was a 45.125 cu in (739.47 cc) displacement V-twin engine racing motorcycle made by Harley-Davidson from 1953 through 1969 for flat track racing. It was also used in road racing in the KRTT faired version. When the KR was first introduced, it dominated motorcycle racing in the United States. In 1970 it was replaced by the long-lived and US race-winning Harley-Davidson XR-750.