Cycle News

CN III ARCHIVES BY LARRY LAWRENCE J oe Parkhurst is generally acknowledged to be the person responsible for bringing a new era of objective journalism to motorcycling in the United States. By launching of Cycle World magazine in 1962, Parkhurst supplied real reviews of mo- torcycles and related products—good or bad—to motorcyclists hungry to read about the burgeoning sport. Parkhurst was also open to the Japanese brands, which were just starting to make an impact on American shores in the early 1960s but were largely ignored by U.S. motorcycling publications of the time. Within a year of its introduction, Cycle World became—and remains—the largest motorcy- cling magazine in the world. Born Joseph Conrad Parkhurst in Jonesboro, Arkansas, on October 20, 1926, he was three when his family moved to California. After graduating from Van Nuys High School, he enlisted in the Army and was a private, stationed in Hawaii. He served in 1954-'56 as a clerk in an Army Reserves office, worked as a junior-level artist at Disney Studios, and then took a job as art direc- tor of Road & Track magazine in Newport Beach. He later took a year-long sabbatical and traveled in Europe, where he was a freelance photographer for the magazine. In 1960, he returned to become art director for a go-kart magazine. Parkhurst was an avid motorcycle enthusiast, but said he could never find anything worthwhile to read about them. So, he decided to start a motor- cycling publication patterned after the high stan- dards of the successful Road & Track magazine. Parkhurst and his first wife, Betty Jean, mortgaged their home and put every last penny they had into getting Cycle World off the ground. Times were tough in the early days of the maga- zine. A publisher of a competing magazine un- derhandedly led an effort to have U.S. and British makers boycott advertising in Cycle World. Initially, the boycott hurt the magazine, but Parkhurst over- came the boycott by putting out a quality publica- tion with fair and accurate road tests and reviews of motorcycles. Parkhurst also enlisted the help of some of the most popular racers of the time to give their impressions of new bikes. Perhaps the biggest coup for Cycle World was the hiring of Gordon Jennings as technical editor. Jennings' prose gave Cycle World its clear voice of authority and credibility. Jennings wrote about the beginnings of Cycle World in one of his last columns for Motorcyclist. "Parkhurst talked the printers into extending a line of credit, sold his sailboat and Porsche, drove around in an old Ford station wagon with match- ing holes in its floor and exhaust system, and on a couple of occasions borrowed eating money from me. It was hollow-belly time for him, and things stayed that way for many lean months. I think most men would have tossed in their cards. He JOE PARKHURST: THE MAN WHO CHANGED MOTORCYCLE P120 PHOTOGRAPHY COURTESY CYCLE WORLD Joe Parkhurst was a pioneer in motorcycle journalism.

• Cover