A Texas Legend

How often in life do you get the chance to share part of your life with a real legend? I was thoroughly blessed by having one of the greatest men Texas had to offer be a part of my life, Johnny Allen. Johnny was quite a man, with gunfighter eyes and absolute nerves of steel.

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When Johnny hooked up with two other legends by the name of Pete Dalio and Jack Wilson, he won 38 dirt track races in his first season. (I could go on forever about Dalio, Wilson, and also Stormy Mangham, but this is about a kind, good man named Johnny Allen.)

Johnny is best known for piloting Stormy Mangham's Texas Cigar. It was tuned by Jack Wilson to a speed of 214 mph at Bonneville Salt Flats on September 6th, 1956. His fame was such that in November of the same year, he toured Europe to tell of this great achievement.

Besides this kind of fame, Johnny was involved in the motorcycle community at every level. He was the Triumph dealer in Ft. Worth, Texas, and added Suzuki to his store later on. The Trailblazers Motorcycle Club met in his store and they still are meeting in Ft. Worth to this day.

As a young racer, Johnny supplied me with a Triumph Roadracer for our Texas races, and later on a Suzuki 500cc Twin, so as to promote his new brand. Not only was he generous and kind, he was tough as a boot. I will never forget the time back in 1966 when I was racing in the Wooley Bugger Enduro and John was on an X6 Hustler, the TC250 high pipe model. Not much of an enduro bike, and I couldn't believe he was riding it.

We were flying across one of the Trinity River levies when the trail all of a sudden veered off and down the sides. Johnny fell for what seemed like forever. I stopped and ran back to help him up, and as I approached him, I could see that he was bleeding down both arms and knees, and he still had that short cigar in his mouth as he jumped up and started the X6 and left me standing there wondering how an old man could do that. After all, he was 36 years old, and to me that was really old.

When John passed away on February 7, 1995, his wife Reva gave me some of his keepsakes and I wanted to share a couple of them with you. The picture of the streamliner was taken in Smithfield, TX, at Stormy's airport -- Mangham Field. In the picture from left to right are Stormy Mangham, Jack Wilson, and Johnny Allen. The dirt track picture is of Johnny after one of his many wins on Texas half-mile tracks.

I would ride my motorcycle out to the airport and just stand next to the streamliner and try to imagine the feeling that he must have had piloting that rocket at 214 mph. I'm sure that he was a lot cooler than I would have been.

Oh, yes, one more thing. We are all so familiar with the legendary Triumph Bonneville. FACT - three years after Johnny's 214 mph run, Triumph named that bike the Bonneville in honor of what a 26-year-old from Texas did.

Thanks for listening to my ramblings!

Little General