Cycle News is a weekly magazine that covers all aspects of motorcycling including Supercross, Motocross and MotoGP as well as new motorcycles
Issue link: https://magazine.cyclenews.com/i/1476305
N ext month, September 25, the San Jose Dons Motorcycle Club will be marking its 90th anniversary with a Sunday evening get-together at its clubhouse. At 90 years old, the San Jose Dons M/C is already one of the oldest motorcycle clubs in the country, but the fact is the club has roots that go back to the very beginnings of motorcycling in Northern California, to the original San Jose Motorcycle Club, which was founded in 1906 and was an outgrowth of the Garden City Wheelman, a bicycling club found- ed in the 1880s. Racing roots run deep in the club. The Dons were founded by racing legends Tom Sifton and Sam Arena in 1932, and club members included nation- ally known riders such as Arena, Kenny Eggers, Larry Headrick and Joe Leonard, just to name a few. Partly because of the efforts of the Dons, San Jose became one of the nation's hotbeds of motorcycle racing and riding activities. The Dons was founded in 1932 when Tom Sifton took over the San Jose Harley-Davidson dealership from Fred J. Merlow. Sifton was the first sub-dealer- ship launched by influential San Francisco Harley dealer Dud Perkins. Sifton had been faithfully working at Perkins' dealership for a decade when Perkins let him to run his own dealership. Unfortu- nately, this was in the depths of the Great Depression, and times were lean for the dealership. Sales of police motorcycles to the local San Jose Police Depart- ment were one of the things that kept them from going under. Sifton, along with a young shop employee and a racer named Sam Arena, started the Dons to get more people ac- tive in motorcycling and to build a strong community of riders. Arena brought the remaining members of the San Jose Motor- CN III ARCHIVES P122 90 YEARS of the SAN JOSE DONS BY LARRY LAWRENCE (Left) Boulder Creek, California, the midway stopping point for the Tin Hat Derby in 1951. (Below) The Tin Hat Derby was one of the premier endurance runs on the West Coast that ran from the late 1930s through to the mid-1950s. This was the perpetual trophy for the overall winner.