John Penton (motorcyclist)

John Penton (born August 19, 1925)[1] was an influential figure in the development of off-road motorcycle racing in the United States during the 1960s and 1970s.[1] He was a national champion enduro rider and entrepreneur who went on to develop an enduro motorcycle brand that bore his name.[1][2] He also founded a successful off-road motorcycle boot and apparel company.[1] Penton was inducted into the AMA Motorcycle Hall of Fame in 1998.[1]

Not to be confused with American football player and coach John Penton.

Motorcycling career

Penton grew up on his family farm near Amherst, Ohio where he learned how to ride a motorcycle on his father's 1914 Harley-Davidson.[1] He served in the Merchant Marine and in the Navy during the Second World War then, returned home and soon bought a Harley-Davidson Knucklehead motorcycle.[1]

Penton entered the grueling Jack Pine 500-Mile Enduro in 1948 where, he was impressed by the performance of the BSA motorcycle ridden by the race winner.[1] The advantage that the nimble, lightweight British motorcycle had over heavier, more powerful motorcycles left an impression on Penton.[1] He rode a BSA B33 to a second-place finish in the 1949 Jack Pine Enduro.[1] The second-place finish inspired Penton to find a better performing enduro motorcycle.[1]

In 1950, Penton and his brothers opened a motorcycle dealership in Amherst where, they sold BSA as well as BMW and NSU motorcycles.[1] Penton became one of the top motorcycle enduro competitors in the nation, representing the United States seven times at the International Six Days Trial (now called International Six Days Enduro) between 1962 and 1970.[3] The International Six Days Trial is a form of off-road motorcycle Olympics which is the oldest annual competition sanctioned by the FIM dating back to 1913.[4] He was also a long-distance motorcyclist, setting a transcontinental crossing record in 1958 when he rode a BMW R69S from New York to Los Angeles in 52 hours and 11 minutes.[5][6]

After winning the 1966 Jack Pine Enduro on a Husqvarna, the Swedish motorcycle manufacturer named him the distributor of the brand for the eastern United States.[1] As the baby boomer generation came of age during the 1960s and 1970s, off-road motorcycling experienced a boom in popularity.[7] Penton sought to capitalize on this boom by providing a lightweight off-road motorcycle.[2] After failing to convince Husqvarna to produce an even lighter off-road machine, he decided make his proposal to the KTM factory in Austria which, at the time produced bicycles and mopeds.[2]

Penton offered to put up $6,000 of his own money if KTM would build prototypes to his specifications which, would be sold in the United States as Penton motorcycles.[1] He formed a successful racing team that supported some of the top enduro racers of the era including his son, Jack Penton who competed in 12 ISDT events as well as Dick Burleson, Carl Cranke and Billy Uhl.[1] By the time Penton sold the distributorship to KTM, approximately 10 years later, more than 25,000 Penton motorcycles had been sold in America.[1]

Penton's innovations also included off-road motorcycling apparel.[1] With the assistance of Italian boot manufacturer Alpinestars, he developed one of the biggest-selling off-road motorcycle boots in the nation.[2] Top motocross racer Bob Hannah wore the boots and consulted on improvements to the design.[1] By the late-1970s, his boot and apparel company accounted for over half the sales in the American market.[1]

He was inducted to the Motorcycle Hall of Fame in 1998.[1] A book, John Penton and the Off-Road Motorcycle Revolution, and a 2014 video documentary about Penton's life, Penton: The John Penton Story, narrated by Lyle Lovett, have been created.[8][9]

Further reading
  • Youngblood, Ed (2014), John Penton and the Off-Road Motorcycle Revolution, ISBN 1495125548
  • "PENTON!", Dirt Bike, 2014
  • "Throwback Thursday: Penton und KTM – John Penton, Gründer der gleichnamigen amerikanischen Offroad-Marke, spielte eine bedeutende Rolle in der Geschichte von KTM. Aufgrund seiner Initiative begann bei KTM die Serienproduktion wettbewerbstauglicher Offroadmotorräder." [Throwback Thursday: Penton and KTM – John Penton, founder of the American offroad brand of the same name, played an important role in the history of KTM. Due to his initiative, KTM began series production of competitive offroad motorcycles.], Official blog (in German), KTM, October 16, 2014

References
  1. AMA Hall of Fame
  2. "Penton!". dirtbikemagazine.com. Retrieved 26 February 2019.
  3. "ISDT Results". isdt.org. Retrieved 23 February 2019.
  4. "History of the International Six Day Trials". ultimatemotorcycling.com. Retrieved 22 February 2019.
  5. Setright 1979, p. 75.
  6. Walker 1999, p. 38.
  7. "Boom Time: American Motocross in the 1970s". motorcyclemuseum.org. Archived from the original on 4 April 2012. Retrieved 23 February 2019.
  8. "The John Penton story", Dirt Bike
  9. Andrew Bornhop Scott Cox (June 19, 2014), "MOVIE REVIEW—Penton: The John Penton Story – With a little help from Austria, this tough American farmer took on the enduro world.", Cycle World

Sources
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