VOL. 53 ISSUE 13 APRIL 5, 2016 P105
would have loved it."
It was easy to understand why. The photo col-
lection covers a period, the 1960s, that it's rare to
find good motorcycle racing photos. And with the
fire that destroyed much of the well-known Maho-
ny Photo Collection late last year, the Bob Myers
Collection takes on even more historical impor-
tance. Riders and family members of deceased
riders were suddenly getting to see photos from
the 1960s they'd never seen before. For many of
the them, the Myers photos that began sharing on
Facebook were especially precious because over
the years some had lost most of the shots of a
former racing family member.
Sites said connecting with the families of
1960s-era racers was one of the more rewarding
aspects of introducing the Bob Myers Collection
into the world.
"Larry Darr's nephew called me and said his
dad's house burned down and they lost all the
family pictures of Larry racing. He asked if I had
any and I was able to help," Sites says. "There's
been several people who'd didn't have photos of
their dad racing or something like that."
Some of the earliest photos from the early '60s
are just Polaroids, yet even some of those look
amazingly sharp. Sites has a friend who owns a
photography business who is helping by doing
photo editing to clean up old prints that might
have faded, curled up or been slightly damaged
over the years. "He makes them look like new
pictures somehow," Sites says.
If Sites can't identify some of the riders in the
old photos, he's found the collective knowledge
of Facebook users has been wonderful for that
purpose.
"Everybody comments when I post them and
tell me who the riders are," Sites explained.
"Don Emde called me about one of the photos I
posted from the 1964 Springfield Mile. He's like,
'Wow David, this picture is so cool! I was at that
race. I was 13 years old and that's my brother in
the middle of the pack.' It's like that with so many
people, bringing back memories for them."
Fortunately for fans of 1960s-era racing, Sites
is more than happy to share the Bob Myers pho-
to collection not for profit, but simply in honor
of his old friend. These photographs sat hidden
away in a forgotten filing cabinet for over 40
years and racing enthusiasts should be grateful
that Myers not only took these great images, but
managed to preserve them all these years. And
now, thanks to David Sites, these long forgotten
gems are out there now for the world to see.
Sites estimates the number of photos at may-
be 1000 or more and he's only posted a couple
hundred so far, so there are a lot more undiscov-
ered images to look forward to seeing.
The best way to peruse the Bob Myers Photo
Collection is to go to Facebook and in the
search box at the top left type in "Bob Myers
photo" and be prepared to spend a lot of time
browsing. CN
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Bob Myers is pictured here with a model from a
promotional shot for his Triumph dealership in the
Washington DC area. Myers was a sponsor of racers
over the years, including Gary Nixon and fortunately
was an excellent photographer and took many great
images from the national races mainly in the 1960s.
