| The Hillclimber | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Artist | Jeff Decker |
| Year | June 2008 |
| Dimensions | 4.9 m(16 ft) |
| Location | Harley-Davidson Museum, Milwaukee |
| 43°01′52.66″N87°54′56.56″W / 43.0312944°N 87.9157111°W | |
| Owner | Harley-Davidson Museum |
The Hillclimber is a public artwork by American artist Jeff Decker located on the grounds of the Harley-Davidson Museum, which is in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, United States.
The Hillclimber is a 5,000 pound bronze welded sculpture that stands 16 feet tall and was created by Jeff Decker. Decker is a Utah-based artist, historian and Harley enthusiast. This sculpture is an enlarged life and 1/2 size of his original called, By the Horns; a sculpture referencing the similarities of bull riding and the sport hill climbing. [1] This was a somewhat collaborative piece done with painter David Uhl, another artist licensed by Harley-Davidson. The rider is shown participating in a sport called hillclimbing, popular in the 1920s and 30s. The figure is free of fear in his eyes as one foot is being swept off the bike and his right arm extends backwards."He is crashing," Decker said of the helmet less young rider. "But every hillclimber crashes. It's part of the race." [2] Hillclimbers were known to race up hills nicknamed the “widow maker” because of the danger and high rate of injury involved in this sport. The sculpture portrays a vintage Harley rider frozen in a skyward wheelie on a DAH bike, one of only six in the world. A documentation to the artist's friendship with Willie and Nancy Davidson can be seen on the gear drive that is inscribed with "Willie G."
This sculpture can be found on the Founders Terrace of the Harley-Davidson Museum in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. [3] The sculpture is located on the most visible part of the museum's site. The piece was a gift from the family of Willie G. Davidson, a senior vice president and chief styling officer at Harley who is the grandson of one of the company founders, William A. Davidson. [1] Willie and Nancy Davidson saw the original By the Horns sculpture and commissioned an enlarged duplicate to donate to the Harley-Davidson Museum.
Harley-Davidson, Inc. is an American motorcycle manufacturer headquartered in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, United States. Founded in 1903, it is one of two major American motorcycle manufacturers to survive the Great Depression along with its historical rival, Indian Motorcycles. The company has survived numerous ownership arrangements, subsidiary arrangements, periods of poor economic health and product quality, and intense global competition to become one of the world's largest motorcycle manufacturers and an iconic brand widely known for its loyal following. There are owner clubs and events worldwide, as well as a company-sponsored, brand-focused museum.
Buell Motorcycles is an American motorcycle manufacturer based in Grand Rapids, MI and was founded in 1983 by ex-Harley-Davidson engineer Erik Buell. Harley-Davidson acquired 49% of Buell in 1993, and Buell became a wholly owned subsidiary of Harley-Davidson by 2003. On November 17, 2006, Buell announced that it had produced and shipped its 100,000th motorcycle.
A softail motorcycle intentionally looks like vintage motorcycles with a rigid hard-tail frame that has a triangle of steel tubes at the rear axle, like on a bicycle frame, but on a Softail these tubes are actually a triangular swingarm, with the shock absorber(s) hidden, as opposed to clearly visible regular twin shocks on both sides of the rear wheel on standard bikes. Since the introduction of the Harley-Davidson FXST Softail in 1983 as a registered trademark of the Motor Company, softail has become a genericized trademark for other models of cruiser motorcycles with rear suspensions hidden for retro style reasons. This was done even though the rear wheel was often hidden behind bags or exhaust pipes.
Erik F. Buell is the founder, former Chairman and Chief Technical Officer of the Buell Motorcycle Company, which eventually merged with Harley-Davidson Corp. Buell is a pioneer of modern race motorcycle technology. Buell is also the founder of Erik Buell Racing.
The Harley-Davidson Museum is an American museum located in Milwaukee, Wisconsin celebrating the more than 100-year history of Harley-Davidson motorcycles. The 12,000-square-meter (130,000 sq ft) three-building complex on 81,000 square meters along the Menomonee River bank contains more than 450 Harley-Davidson motorcycles and hundreds of thousands of artifacts from the Harley-Davidson Motor Company's 118-year history.
The Harley-Davidson Super Glide was a motorcycle made by the Harley-Davidson. Reputed to be the first factory custom motorcycle, it originated Harley-Davidson's FX series of motorcycles by mating Sportster components, most notably the front end, with the chassis of their larger big twin motorcycles. Super Glide models from 1991 to 2018 were based on the Dyna Glide chassis which has a wider variety of front ends and trim levels, and for a time filled the intermediate niche between the smallest and largest Harley-Davidson models; the Dyna platform has since been discontinued for the 2018 model year in favor of the new Softail frame, with some models from the Dyna nameplate being carried over to the Softail line. They are an exclusive stock
William Godfrey "Willie G." Davidson is an American businessman and motorcycle designer, and the former senior vice president & chief styling officer of Harley-Davidson Motor Company. He was also the head of Harley-Davidson's Willie G. Davidson Product Development Center in Wauwatosa, Wisconsin. While being generally responsible for approving Harley-Davidson motorcycle designs, he also personally designed several motorcycles for Harley-Davidson, including the Super Glide and the Low Rider, which pioneered the factory custom motorcycle and created an intermediate line of motorcycles between their large touring models and their smaller Sportsters.
The Harley-Davidson XR-750 is a racing motorcycle made by Harley-Davidson since 1970, primarily for dirt track racing, but also for road racing in the XRTT variant. The XR-750 was designed in response to a 1969 change in AMA Grand National Championship rules that leveled the playing field for makes other than Harley-Davidson, allowing Japanese and British motorcycles to outperform the previously dominant Harley-Davidson KR race bike. The XR-750 went on to win the most races in the history of American Motorcyclist Association (AMA) racing.
Buzz Kanter is the editor-in-chief and publisher of American Iron Magazine, American Iron Garage and American Iron Salute magazine, and was inducted into the American Motorcyclist Association Hall of Fame in 2002. Buzz was also inducted into the National Motorcycle Museum and Hall of Fame and the Sturgis Motorcycle Hall of Fame.
The following outline is provided as an overview of motorcycles and motorcycling:
Jeff Decker is a sculptor and historian who is known for his bronze sculptures, the most notable of which is titled "By the Horns", a 16-foot-tall, 5,000-pound bronze located on the grounds of the Harley-Davidson Museum. His bronze-cast sculptures depicting the synergy of man and modern machines, particularly historic motorcycles, is known in both the motorcycling community and the world of fine art. As of 2009, Decker was Harley-Davidson's official sculptor.
Jeffrey L. Bleustein is an American business executive, and the former Chief executive officer of Harley-Davidson. He is credited with helping save the company from possible bankruptcy in the 1980s, and leading the company's resurgence as the dominant motorcycle manufacturer in the United States.
The Harley-Davidson Model W, also known as the Sport Twin, is a motorcycle made by Harley-Davidson from 1919 to 1923. Unusually for a Harley-Davidson motorcycle, the Model W had a flat-twin engine and a trailing link fork. The Model W set speed records on runs from New York City to Chicago and from the Canada–United States border to the Mexico–United States border. Slow home market sales led to the end of production after four years.
William Herbert Davidson was president of Harley-Davidson Motorcycles from 1942 to 1971. His father, William A. Davidson, was one of the company founders and his sons, John A. Davidson was a company president and Willie G. Davidson was a company vice-president.
Scott Jacobs is an American painter known for his photorealistic work of Harley-Davidson motorcycles. He became the company's first official licensed artist in 1993. Born in New Jersey, Jacobs currently lives with his family in South Dakota.
David Uhl is an American artist who specializes in oil paintings of vintage Harley-Davidson motorcycles and is known for his Women of Harley-Davidson collection.
The Harley-Davidson XLCR was an American café racer motorcycle manufactured by Harley-Davidson between 1977 and 1979.
Mathew A. Hintz, known professionally as Mathew "boo" Hintz, was an American painter who painted and drew in the impressionist style. He focused on motorcycles and motorcycle cultures, specifically Harley-Davidson.
Harley and the Davidsons is a 2016 American television miniseries directed by Ciarán Donnelly and Stephen Kay, and co-written by Nick Schenk, Evan Wright and Seth Fisher which dramatizes the origins of motorcycle manufacturer Harley-Davidson, and how Arthur Davidson founded the company together with his brothers Walter Davidson, Sr. and William A. Davidson, along with their childhood friend William S. Harley.
The Harley-Davidson Fat Boy, is a V-twin softail cruiser motorcycle with solid-cast disc wheels. Designed by Willie G. Davidson and Louie Netz, Harley-Davidson built a prototype Fat Boy in Milwaukee for the Daytona Bike Week rally at Daytona Beach in 1988 and 1989. Fat Boys produced from 1990-2017 are coded FLSTF, and FLFB from 2018.
