correction to an old post re: origin of Hell's Angels and POBOB's
bud hufstetler
While doing a Google search I came across this old thread posted to your group:
From:Scott Campbell (thunderin...@msn.com)
Subject:Re: Page to Mongrel Mob Martie
Newsgroups:alt.music.led-zeppelin, alt.alien.vampire.flonk.flonk.flonk,
aus.motorcycles
View: Complete Thread (66 articles) | Original Format
Date:2001-11-09 08:35:07 PST
"anonyme" <ano...@meow.org> wrote in message
news:gpbnutoli5f0lj99v...@4ax.com...
> On Tue, 6 Nov 2001 11:26:26 -0600 "Scott Campbell"
> <thunderin...@msn.com> wrote from
> alt.alien.vampire.flonk.flonk.flonk:
>
> >> The group known as the Hell's Angels was started shortly after WWII.
> >> That would make them having been around 60 years or so.
> >Barger incorperated the Angels in the '60's. The Berdoo chapter formed
> >after absorbing the legendary Booze Fighters club. The Angels kept many of
> >the same bylaws as the Booze Fighters, such as the rule: Booze Fighters Up.
> >Which means that a member could lose his colors if he somehow found himself
> >unconscious and laying on his back, thus covering up the coveted patch.
> >During parties on runs, a couple of Booze Fighters might strike a deal to
> >keep an eye on each other in case of passing out from too much partaking of
> >the various stimulii. It was also just a way to fuck with the
> >"lightweights" that passed out at parties first. God help you if you pass
> >out first at the parties of some. You might be set on fire with lighter
> >fluid and "pissed out" by a handful of giggling Angels.
>
> Or a lot worse could happen. Hard drugs are taboo as well.
You're fucking nuts.
> "Outlaw"
> motorcycle clubs began on the West Coast shortly after WWII. It's
> thought that returning veterans couldn't adjust and formed groups
> called the Booze Fighters, The Galloping Gooses <g>, Satan's Sinners,
> and the Winos. The group to have the greatest impact was a bunch of
> bikers called the Pissed Off Bastards of Bloomington -- who eventually
> became the Hell's Angels, not the Booze Fighters.
Wrong. The Booze Fighters were the club that became the Angels. They
took a couple of members from this club or that club when they formed their
charter, but it's the same process they use to this day when they absorb a
club. When they Angels decide to take over a territory and a particular
club from that area, the club may have 30 members or more but maybe only one
or two have the mud to make the grade as Angels. The rest will be sent
packing.
And the P.O.B.O.B.s were never much of an entity. They were more of a
street gang that terrorized Frisco for maybe a summer or two but most were
absorbed into the Market Street Commandos and the Booze Fighters.
> They took the name
> and the helmeted death's head symbol from a WWII bomber squadron. The
> founding chapter was in San Bernardino (Berdoo).
You should get a Hell's Angels tattoo, Kate. A big one on your back.
[...]
> Source: Kathy Reichs, Deadly Decisions.
Your source is a blockhead.
--
Scott Campbell - mhm 24x12
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As I am not a Hell's Angel, I would never presume to speak for them, however as
the son of one of the founding members of the POBOB's I can shed a little light
on them.
First of all, the POBOB's had absolutely no connection to the San Francisco bay
area.The club was founded in the late 1940's in the small rural town of
Bloomington,California several hundred miles south of SF by my father, Bob
Hufstetler, my uncle Ronnie Hufstetler and their buddies from Colton High
School, Moose Wilkerson, the Houchens brothers, the Scherer brothers and
several other friends whose names escape me at the moment(please accept my
apologies). The one thing they had in common was they were all Okies, people
who had come to California from Oklahoma.
Although they are only remembered now as the Pissed Off Bastards Of
Bloomington,my dad says the reason they only used the initials (POBOB's) was
so they could avoid offending their mothers by telling them the name of the
club was Poor Okie Boys Of Bloomington. My grandmother who is almost 100 years
old still swears that was the only thing they ever called themselves, and it
was their enemies, rival clubs comprised of Arkies (people originally from
Arkansas), prunepickers (native Californians) and cholos or wetbacks (the
derogatory terms for Mexicans at the time) who renamed them "Pissed Off
Bastards".
They were a car club when first started, but quickly switched to being a
motorcycle club when the market was flooded with dirt cheap WWII Harleys, a
fact which very few people are aware of. A member of my family has what may be
the only surviving POBOB's car club plaque, a cast metal emblem about the size
of a U.S. license plate which all the members mounted on the rear shelf of
their car so that everyone who saw it would know the car owner was a POBOB.
As a sidenote, every single POBOB I've ever met swears semi-seriously, they
are the one who Marlon Brando's character in "The Wild One" was based upon.
My dad and others have told me the relationship between the POBOB's and the
birth of the Hell's Angels, but out of respect for them I don't feel it is my
place to tell that part of the story. Let me just say that our house in the
1950's was where I remember meeting a lot of Hell's Angels when they stopped by
to visit my dad. Here are a couple of links (one of which
purports to be an interview with Chuck Zito) which might shed a little light on
it.
http://www.morningside.edu/masscomm/DrRoss/Chap2.html
http://www.philipcarlo.com/view_zito.html
My uncle, Ronnie died about 20 years ago. When Moose died 4 or 5 years ago,
there were only a few POBOB's left. My dad may be the last remaining original
POBOB and he is not in the best of shape. The years of hard living took their
toll on all the guys, but they were, for the most part, all good, honest, hard
working family men who were a little rowdier than most (Ronnie was the
light-heavyweight boxing champ at Chino State Penitentiary during his forced
vacation there). Most of them were hard drinking, hard fighting, fun loving
guys.Marijuana was thought to be as bad as heroin back then, so they for the
most part stayed away from that. For those that did drugs, Benzedrine was
their drug of choice and led to the heart damage that killed most of them
decades later.
I could go on much longer, but this is already long enough. Especially since I
have no idea if there is any interest in the subject. If anyone is interested
in knowing more about the POBOB's, just reply to this post and I'll be happy to
tell you anything I can that interests you about the POBOB's
Bud Hufstetler
±
June 30, 2002
THE STATE
Town Gears Up for Biker Rally
Event: Some worry that two clubs' lethal rivalry will spawn violence.
But others optimistically welcome the visitors.
By RONE TEMPEST, TIMES STAFF WRITER
HOLLISTER, Calif. -- Ever since a deadly Nevada casino shootout between
rival motorcycle gangs in late April, a high-noon atmosphere has been
building in this Central California farm town where the two gangs are
expected on the Fourth of July.
Questions have surfaced that seem incongruous in these bucolic
surroundings. Will the Mongols invade? Will the Angels retaliate? What
will it mean for the lucrative Hollister Methodist Church pancake
breakfast?
"I'm worried that the potential for trouble is high," said San Benito
County Sheriff-Coroner Curtis Hill. Some here see the sheriff as a brave
sentinel and others as a wet blanket tossed on this town's biggest
party.
Since it started five years ago, the Fourth of July weekend Hollister
Independence Rally has annually attracted thousands of motorcycle club
members--packs of leather-clad men and women astride growling Harleys.
Most are harmless weekend enthusiasts. But a few are the self-proclaimed
"one-percenters" from criminally linked outlaw motorcycle clubs.
Based on the town's historic role in inspiring the famous Marlon Brando
biker movie "The Wild One," the three-day rally has become a huge
production, doubling San Benito County's 56,000 population. Stalwart
civic groups such as the Rotary Club and the Methodist church
enthusiastically pitch in, using biker largess to fund Little League
teams and old-age programs.
But in light of the April 27 shootout between Mongols and Hells Angels
motorcycle bands in Laughlin, Nev., people here are wondering if tiny
Hollister has made a pact with the devil. In nearby Ventura County,
after all, two biker meets were recently canceled.
"It makes me a little edgy that nobody in the community was asked if we
wanted to give up our town for three or four days," said Rick Jennings,
a retired San Jose firefighter who lives here. "Meanwhile, the Laughlin
episode tells us that something like that could happen here."
It is one thing, said Jennings and others, to have their town invaded by
hordes of middle-aged weekend bikers--Mild Ones--with bulging pockets.
It would be another matter entirely, they said, if a new generation
intent on revenge arrived, packing automatic weapons.
Three men--two Mongols and a Hells Angel--died in the April shootout at
Harrah's Casino. Another Hells Angel was gunned down on the highway
leaving town. Sixteen people were injured in the casino melee.
Since then, biker events have been held in Northern California and
Nevada without serious incidents.
No Mongols were among the 7,000 leather-garbed participants at the June
7-9 Redwood Run Motorcycle Rally outside Garberville, north of San
Francisco. Violence was also avoided in Elko, Nev., after city officials
in that traditionally firearm-friendly community took the unprecedented
step of banning weapons in the downtown area for the June 21-23
motorcycle jamboree, attended by 5,000 bikers.
However, Elko Police Chief Clair Morris reported one tense scene in
which 50 uniformed officers surrounded three dozen bikers involved in a
bar fight after a performance by a band named 38 Special.
In Phoenix, police are investigating possible gang connections to the
June 11 slaying of a Hells Angels member, wearing his club regalia, from
Ventura County outside a local bar. "It could be fallout," Phoenix
Police Sgt. Lauri Williams told reporters who asked about the possible
Laughlin connection.
Hollister rally organizers seem fairly confident that the Laughlin
episode will not be repeated here.
"We are right on schedule," said rally committee staffer Ellen Brown.
She said three Hells Angels chapters plan to operate booths at the
rally, selling biker paraphernalia.
But law enforcement officials are anxious about reports that Mongols
plan to crash the Hells Angels-dominated party.
With tensions building between the two motorcycle clubs, the potential
for a showdown is such that Sheriff Hill said more than 100 state and
federal outlaw-motorcycle-gang specialists, twice the normal number for
the event, are planning to attend as observers.
He said he has added more surveillance cameras to the main
intersections. The Police Department also brings in 40 officers from
nearby law enforcement agencies just for the event.
The Hollister City Council enacted crowd-control measures, including one
prohibiting the display of female breasts (except those belonging to
nursing mothers). The council also banned glass containers (except for
baby bottles) in the four-block downtown area reserved for the rally.
Meanwhile, the Mongols' and Hells Angels' Web site chat rooms are full
of messages inciting the two groups to continue their open warfare.
The friction surfaced about two years ago when the upstart Mongol group,
whose "patron saint" is the 12th century warrior Genghis Khan, began
opening chapters in traditional Hells Angels territory, including
Oakland and Hollister.
"Never forget those who died for the Mongol Nation," wrote one supporter
from San Jose. "Remember, brotherhood is forever. Never let anyone take
your kindness for weakness." Such talk has local lawmen concerned.
"You have to wonder when the next shoe is going to fall," said Hollister
Police Capt. Bob Brooks, an 18-year veteran. "I think we are fooling
ourselves to think that they took care of things in Laughlin. Something
will happen in the future. Will it be in Hollister?"
Rally organizers say the authorities are being alarmists.
"We have more trouble at our local rodeo parade," said Independence
Rally Committee marketing director Mark Maxwell, who helped found the
event in 1997. "More fights, more drunken incidents. More general
problems."
Tooling into town on bikes that cost up to $25,000 each, the visitors,
Maxwell estimated, spend an average of $350 on food and lodging during
their stay, producing $5 million to $8 million in income for the local
tax rolls, which amounts to about $200,000 in tax revenue.
Maxwell contends that the visiting bikers have too much invested, too
much respect for the town and too many miles on their personal odometers
to make any trouble here.
"This is a whole different phenomenon here," he said. "These people are
just buying an image as little outlaws for the weekend."
The outlaw image has been much cultivated since the first Independence
Rally in 1997, which was held on the 50th anniversary of what has become
known as the Hollister Incident.
In the years just after World War II, California became a magnet for
weekend motorcycling, popular with returning servicemen, many of whom
had learned to ride bikes in the military. The July 4, 1947, a
motorcycle race outside Hollister was attended by 4,000 people,
including members of a badly behaved motorcycle club called the
Boozefighters.
At the 1947 races, a few Boozefighters, true to their name, got very
drunk, jumped the curb and rode their motorcycles into Johnny's Bar on
Hollister's main drag. One Boozefighter was arrested for attempting to
pour alcohol into a bus radiator.
Mostly, it was about "partying and playing. There wasn't a riot, nobody
got raped in the streets and nobody burned the town down," one
Boozefighter veteran recalled on the club's Web site.
The 1947 revelry was captured in a famously staged Life magazine
photograph showing a loutish male rider swilling beer from a bottle on a
parked Harley roadster, a sea of empties around his front wheel. The
picture inspired a fictional Harper's magazine short story by Frank
Rooney. The short story, in turn, inspired the classic 1953 film "The
Wild One," starring Brando.
Evocative of the contemporary rivalry between the Mongols and the Hells
Angels, the movie depicted a split between two motorcycle gangs, the
Black Rebels Motorcycle Club headed by the Brando character, Johnny, and
the Beetles led by Chino, a loathsome character played by Lee Marvin.
The film carried a disclaimer that would be endorsed enthusiastically by
some Hollister residents: "This is a shocking story that could never
take place in most American towns--but it did in this one. It is a
public challenge not to let it happen again."
Thus the "outlaw" biker image was born, earning Hollister the
right--nearly half a century later--to dub itself the "Birthplace of the
American Biker." Maxwell said he expects 80,000 people to attend this
year's rally. Cherise Tyson, owner of Johnny's Bar, the unofficial
center of the biker rally, said she has to hire 32 additional employees,
including seven bouncers, to handle the huge crowds of bikers.
"Over a five- to six-day period, I do three months' worth of business,"
said Tyson, who describes her clientele as "the nicest people you'll
ever meet and the biggest tippers in the world." Another enthusiastic
rally supporter is the Rev. Ardyss Golden, pastor of the Methodist
church. Since the first rally in 1997, the church has hosted a $6
all-you-can-eat pancake breakfast.
Golden said that last year the church "cleared about $7,000 in three
days" from the breakfast, by far its biggest source of money for charity
projects.
A gentle Nebraska native, the minister also participates in the annual
blessing of the bikes at the local Catholic church. She said some Hells
Angels even attend religious services. As for the events in Laughlin and
their potential violent spillover into Hollister, Golden said she is not
concerned. "We are a church," she said. "We would welcome even the
Mongols if they came. God's love is also for the bad guys."
cbr...@gmail.com
Thank you.
pobob...@gmail.com
Is there any way you can get in touch with me?
Henri
Hi, I'm the French Editor of the website www.culture-biker.com and we are preparing an article about the early days of the POBOB. Could you please get in touch with me ?
Thanks !
loeven...@gmail.com
jdrak...@gmail.com
Do you happen to know the year the back centerpiece patch on the cut was changed from the rebel flag to Ace the aviator? And for what reason?
Thanks.
JDrake
jdrak...@gmail.com
Thanks.
JDrake
scottr...@gmail.com
juin...@gmail.com
dane...@gmail.com
Snuhwolf
>Does anyone know of a pobob member with the last name holland? Would have been 40s and 50s.
