Being Evel Page #4

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went up the jump,

and waved at the crowd.

he didn't-- he didn't care about

the snakes.

people started talking to him,

you know, "what--

you know,

what can you do next?"

and he started thinking about

that kind of stuff.

that's when he come up

with the idea

of starting a stunt show.

i told him, i said,

"they're gonna eat you up, boy.

you'll never make it."

tim perior:

i was a bartender

at marty's bar

in orange, california,

and this fella comes in,

sits at the end of the bar,

and we start talking.

well,

he's a motorcycle daredevil,

and he had

jumped rattlesnakes,

and he wants to do a big

ramp-to-ramp jump.

he said,

"people will go wild,"

and he just convinced me.

somehow i was able

to get two pickups,

a tractor,

and 40-foot trailer.

the logo on the side

was "evel knievel

and his motorcycle

daredevils."

well, the name evel came

from his wild years in butte.

he was given that name

by the cops.

he was in jail

with a guy named "knawful."

and they said, "well,

better lock up the doors

pretty good tonight.

we got an awful knawful

and evil knievel in here."

blackenship:
he heard that,

and he liked that.

perior:

he changed it to e-v-e-l

because he didn't

want to sound too evil.

what he did is get a bunch

of people working with him.

good guys like sweet savage

and eddie mulder

and klesh fargo.

gunn:

so he started thinking up

different stunts to do.

perior:

the flaming boards,

we'd soak 'em in gasoline

and light it on fire.

leeuwen:
and he'd hit that

first board and just go boom!

and the sparks,

the stuff would fly in the air!

and then, boom!

hit the second one!

sparks would fly!

and, boom, hit the third one!

hit the fourth one,

and the fifth one...

somehow, bob got this midget

called butch willhelm,

and talked him

into joining the show.

bob said, "he will do

everything i do in miniature."

and he would crash

on every single one.

so then it looked like when bob

was going to make his jump,

something terrible

is going to happen.

he was such

a crazy son of a b*tch.

he'd do these stunts,

and he never tried 'em before.

one time he had a motorcycle

run at him

about 60 miles an hour,

and he jumped up,

but he didn't jump

high enough.

perior:
and the motorcycle

hit him and flipped him over.

he was sprained

from his waist to his ankles.

man:
i think at that

point is when he decided

he was just gonna stick

to jumping the motorcycles.

robbie knievel:

the equipment my dad jumped on,

compared to what's

going on today--

unbelievable.

leeuwen:

the thing weighed 500 pounds.

it'd be like jumping a dump

truck over all those cars,

but he'd do it anyway.

i was the speedometer

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