Indian Larry (born Lawrence DeSmedt; April 28, 1949 – August 30, 2004) was an American
motorcycle
A motorcycle (motorbike, bike; uni (if one-wheeled); trike (if three-wheeled); quad (if four-wheeled)) is a lightweight private 1-to-2 passenger personal motor vehicle Steering, steered by a Motorcycle handlebar, handlebar from a saddle-style ...
builder and artist, stunt rider, and biker. He first became known as Indian Larry in the 1980s when he was riding the streets of New York City on a
chopped Indian motorcycle. Respected as an old school chopper builder, Larry sought greater acceptance of choppers being looked upon as an art form. He became interested in
hot rod
Hot rods are typically American cars that might be old, classic, or modern and that have been rebuilt or modified with large engines optimized for speed and acceleration. One definition is: "a car that's been stripped down, souped up and ma ...
s and motorcycles at an early age and was a fan of
Von Dutch and
Ed "Big Daddy" Roth, whom he would later meet in California.
Wide acknowledgment of Indian Larry's talent only came in the last few years of his life. He died in 2004 from injuries sustained in a motorcycle accident while performing at a bike show. His bike, ''Grease Monkey'', was featured in ''
Easyriders
''Easyriders'' is an American motorcycle magazine, founded in 1970. It was published monthly by Paisano Publications for over 50 years.
In addition to its coverage of motorcycles (particularly Harley-Davidsons) and related activities, ''Easyrid ...
'' magazine in September 1998. In 2001 Indian Larry participated in the
Discovery Channel
Discovery Channel, known as The Discovery Channel from 1985 to 1995, and often referred to as simply Discovery, is an American cable channel that is best known for its ongoing reality television shows and promotion of pseudoscience.
It init ...
program ''Motorcycle Mania II'', followed by three different ''
Biker Build-Off'' programs. During this period he and his team built the motorcycles, ''Daddy-O'' (known to most people as the ''
Rat Fink'' bike), ''Wild Child'', and ''Chain of Mystery''.
Early life and education
Indian Larry was born Lawrence DeSmedt in
Cornwall-on-Hudson, New York on April 28, 1949. He grew up in the
Newburgh, New York area including the town of
New Windsor.
The oldest of three children, with two younger sisters, Diane and Tina, Larry was described by his mother, Dorothy, as "a good boy, but mischievous."
[Biography special on Indian Larry. Program included interviews with Larry's sister Tina, his mother Dorothy, wife Bambi, friend Timothy White, and others; footage of Larry from past '' Biker Build-Off'' programs; segments showing Billy Lane, Paul Cox, Keino, and Kendall Johnson and crew building tribute bike they named "Love Zombie". Executive Producer: Thom Beers. Co-Executive Producers: Tracy Green, Hugh King. Producer/Writer/Editor: Larry Law. Discovery Channel. 2005.] Larry's strict father, Augustine, was a carpenter at
United States Military Academy
The United States Military Academy (USMA), commonly known as West Point, is a United States service academies, United States service academy in West Point, New York that educates cadets for service as Officer_(armed_forces)#United_States, comm ...
and had built the family's home. He wanted his son to follow in his footsteps in the carpentry trade.
As a boy Larry liked
Lincoln logs
Lincoln Logs are an American construction toy for children, consisting of square-notched miniature lightweight logs used to build small forts and buildings. They were invented around 1916 by John Lloyd Wright, second son of well-known architect ...
and Ed "Big Daddy" Roth
Revell
Revell GmbH is an American-origin manufacturer of plastic model, plastic scale models, currently based in Bünde, Germany. The original Revell company merged with Monogram (company), Monogram in 1986, becoming "Revell-Monogram". The business op ...
plastic model kits.
Roth, a legendary California artist and hot rod builder, was a big influence on Larry and his style would later bubble up to influence Indian Larry's motorcycle designs.
Larry attended a
Catholic
The Catholic Church (), also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the List of Christian denominations by number of members, largest Christian church, with 1.27 to 1.41 billion baptized Catholics Catholic Church by country, worldwid ...
elementary school where he suffered abuse. The
nuns
A nun is a woman who vows to dedicate her life to religious service and contemplation, typically living under vows of Evangelical counsels, poverty, chastity, and obedience in the Enclosed religious orders, enclosure of a monastery or convent.' ...
would hit his knuckles until they bled and lock him in dark closets.
[Nichols; Cambridge. - p. 20, 22, 29.] He kept what was occurring to himself, and didn't tell his family what was going on. When his mother asked about his knuckles, Larry would always just say that he had gotten into a fight.
It wasn't until years later that his family learned what had actually happened.
As a child Larry was described as being sensitive and artistic, and "feeling more than most."
A well-known anecdote about Indian Larry is that as a kid he attempted to build a bomb in his parents' basement in order to blow up the Catholic school.
The contraption exploded taking off the little finger of Larry's left hand. Another version of the story states that the injury occurred while he was trying to build a skyrocket for the
4th of July
Fourth or the fourth may refer to:
* the ordinal form of the number 4
* ''Fourth'' (album), by Soft Machine, 1971
* Fourth (angle), an ancient astronomical subdivision
* Fourth (music), a musical interval
* ''The Fourth'', a 1972 Soviet drama
...
.
When asked about the experience of being maimed as a kid during a 2003 ''Biker Build-Off'' program, Larry seemed to have come to peace with it:
As a youth Larry participated in the
Boy Scouts
Boy Scouts or Boy Scout may refer to:
* Members, sections or organisations in the Scouting Movement
** Scout (Scouting), a boy or a girl participating in the worldwide Scouting movement
** Scouting America, formerly known as Boy Scouts of America ...
. His scoutmaster, Gerald Doering, had raced
Indian motorcycles which had an influence on Larry.
Larry's first build was when he took his little sister Tina's
tricycle
A tricycle, sometimes abbreviated to trike, is a Human-powered transport, human-powered (or gasoline or electric motor powered or assisted, or gravity powered) Three-wheeler, three-wheeled vehicle.
Some tricycles, such as cycle rickshaws (for pa ...
and equipped it with
Schwinn bicycle handlebars and a lawn mower engine.
According to a ''
Rolling Stone
''Rolling Stone'' is an American monthly magazine that focuses on music, politics, and popular culture. It was founded in San Francisco, California, in 1967 by Jann Wenner and the music critic Ralph J. Gleason.
The magazine was first known fo ...
'' interview that was mentioned in a ''
New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...
'' article, Larry's first motorcycle was a 1939
Harley Knucklehead that he bought when he was a teenager for a couple hundred dollars. "Within hours, he had taken it apart, and it took him nine months to put it back together."
As a young man Larry learned how to weld from Conrad Stenglein in the Newburgh, New York area. The shop was simple. As Stenglein described it: "All we had in the shop was a
welding machine,
torch
A torch is a stick with combustible material at one end which can be used as a light source or to set something on fire. Torches have been used throughout history and are still used in processions, symbolic and religious events, and in juggl ...
es,
grinder,
body putty, stuff like that."
Quality of work was important to Larry early on. Stenglein said that "Whatever part we made for a bike, it had to be strong and had to be good, that was our thing. It had to be perfect. If Larry put something on a bike that he didn't like, he'd cut it off. That's how he was."
A month before he was to graduate from high school, Larry told his mother that he was heading to California to join his younger sister Diane who was deeply immersed in the 1960s
counterculture
A counterculture is a culture whose values and norms of behavior differ substantially from those of mainstream society, sometimes diametrically opposed to mainstream cultural mores.Eric Donald Hirsch. ''The Dictionary of Cultural Literacy''. Ho ...
(Diane had run away from home when she was 16). In California Larry also took part in the scene and delved into drugs. Larry saw his sister Diane as a kindred spirit who understood what it was like to feel like an outsider in society. On June 21, 1971, Diane was murdered. Larry accompanied her body back to their hometown for her funeral. The experience was emotionally devastating to him.
Coupled with his grief, Larry was spiraling into
drug addiction
Addiction is a neuropsychological disorder characterized by a persistent and intense urge to use a drug or engage in a behavior that produces natural reward, despite substantial harm and other negative consequences. Repetitive drug use can ...
. To pay for the drugs he was robbing stores. The cops had an idea that it was Larry but had not been able to catch him so they set up a
sting operation
In law enforcement, a sting operation is a deceptive operation designed to catch a person attempting to commit a crime. A typical sting will have an undercover law enforcement officer, detective, or co-operative member of the public play a rol ...
. In 1972 as Larry was exiting a bank he had just robbed, he was fired upon by two police officers. He narrowly escaped being killed when one of the bullets grazed his eyebrow.
At the age of 23, Larry was sent to
Sing Sing
Sing Sing Correctional Facility is a maximum-security prison for men operated by the New York State Department of Corrections and Community Supervision in the village of Ossining (village), New York, Ossining, New York, United States. It is abou ...
prison for three years. During his incarceration Larry earned his
GED
Ged or GED may refer to:
Places
* Ged, Louisiana, an unincorporated community in the United States
* Ged, a village in Bichiwara Tehsil, Dungarpur District, Rajasthan, India
* Delaware Coastal Airport, in Delaware, US, callsign GED
People
* Ged B ...
, and started taking courses in
welding
Welding is a fabrication (metal), fabrication process that joins materials, usually metals or thermoplastics, primarily by using high temperature to melting, melt the parts together and allow them to cool, causing Fusion welding, fusion. Co ...
and mechanics. Prison was "the place where he honed all his best mechanic skills." He also asked his mother to send him a dictionary and books on philosophy and other topics. He was released in September 1976.
Move to New York City
After completing
parole
Parole, also known as provisional release, supervised release, or being on paper, is a form of early release of a prisoner, prison inmate where the prisoner agrees to abide by behavioral conditions, including checking-in with their designated ...
, Larry relocated to New York City where he became involved with the underground scene. The first magazine article about Indian Larry was in ''Iron Horse Magazine'' in 1987. It featured his 1950
Indian Chief chopper with red-orange flames. It was during this period that people began to call him Indian Larry.
[Nichols; Cambridge. - p. 60.] In the 1980s he hung out with
Robert Mapplethorpe
Robert Michael Mapplethorpe ( ; November 4, 1946 – March 9, 1989) was an American photographer, best known for his black-and-white photographs. His work featured an array of subjects, including celebrity portraits, male and female Nude (art), n ...
and
Andy Warhol
Andy Warhol (;''Random House Webster's Unabridged Dictionary''"Warhol" born Andrew Warhola Jr.; August 6, 1928 – February 22, 1987) was an American visual artist, film director and producer. A leading figure in the pop art movement, Warhol ...
.
Mapplethorpe in particular was "attracted to Indian Larry's 'crash and burn'" lifestyle.
One of the photographs that he took of Indian Larry ended up on the cover of ''
Artforum
''Artforum'' is an international monthly magazine specializing in contemporary art. The magazine is distinguished from other magazines by its unique 10½ × 10½ inch square format, with each cover often devoted to the work of an artist. Notably ...
'' magazine.
Indian Larry began working in different motorcycle shops in New York City and New Jersey during the 1980s and early 1990s. Often he would be rebuilding motors out of his apartment. For many years Larry struggled with
alcohol abuse
Alcohol abuse encompasses a spectrum of alcohol-related substance abuse. This spectrum can range from being mild, moderate, or severe. This can look like consumption of more than 2 drinks per day on average for men, or more than 1 drink per ...
and
heroin
Heroin, also known as diacetylmorphine and diamorphine among other names, is a morphinan opioid substance synthesized from the Opium, dried latex of the Papaver somniferum, opium poppy; it is mainly used as a recreational drug for its eupho ...
. In November 1991, during a period when he was living around the
Bowery
The Bowery () is a street and neighbourhood, neighborhood in Lower Manhattan in New York City, New York. The street runs from Chatham Square at Park Row (Manhattan), Park Row, Worth Street, and Mott Street in the south to Cooper Square at 4th ...
, Larry was going through severe
withdrawals one night, wandering the streets cutting himself with a broken beer bottle. Larry would later say, "I was homeless, shirtless, penniless, showerless...I had nothing. I had nothing left".
According to Larry's sister Tina, when a cop arrived on the scene shining a spotlight in Larry's face, Larry told him, "Just shoot me." They committed him to
Bellevue Hospital
Bellevue Hospital (officially NYC Health + Hospitals/Bellevue and formerly known as Bellevue Hospital Center) is a hospital in New York City and the oldest public hospital in the United States. One of the largest hospitals in the United States ...
.
It was through Bellevue that Larry got connected up with a drug and alcohol program.
Larry had "1991" and "1994" tattooed on his arm, as he explained that he had to go back after his initial treatment.
Larry struggled with a familiar cycle for years. As friend and bike building partner
Paul Cox explained: "...he would go through periods of time when he didn't think he deserved fame or whatever, and would sabotage himself by doing drugs. Larry would attack himself internally and head down a self-destructive spiral." It was not until the late 1990s that Larry was finally able to free himself and stop using. Mentioning the long journey that it took, Larry expressed that he didn't think that he could do it all over again. "It was too hard," he said.
Larry's friend photographer
Timothy White expressed, "drugs didn't belong with Larry and I think Larry knew that and it wasn't until he got to a point that he really realized that – only at that point could he let it all go. And once he did, his life changed completely. It changed completely, like nobody I've ever seen."
Chopper builder
Indian Larry, along with Paul Cox, Fritz "Spritz by Fritz" Schenck, Steg Von Heintz, and Frank, formed the crew at Psycho Cycles on New York's
Lower East Side
The Lower East Side, sometimes abbreviated as LES, is a historic neighborhood in the southeastern part of Manhattan in New York City. It is located roughly between the Bowery and the East River from Canal to Houston streets. Historically, it w ...
beginning in the early 1990s.
During this period they created a distinct New York City chopper style.
In 2000, Larry and friends opened Gasoline Alley in
Brooklyn
Brooklyn is a Boroughs of New York City, borough of New York City located at the westernmost end of Long Island in the New York (state), State of New York. Formerly an independent city, the borough is coextensive with Kings County, one of twelv ...
.
Larry is credited with helping to re-popularize the stripped down, tall handlebar, foot clutched,
jockey shifted, no front brake or fender, small gas tank, open piped,
kick start
Kick start is a method of starting an internal combustion engine (usually that of a motorcycle) by pushing a ratcheting lever with the rider's foot. Kick start mechanisms were almost universally a part of motorcycle engines before the mid-1970s ...
only, stock
rake
Rake may refer to:
Common meanings
* Rake (tool), a horticultural implement, a long-handled tool with tines
* Rake (stock character), a man habituated to immoral conduct
* Rake (poker), the commission taken by the house when hosting a poker game
...
choppers that prevailed in the 1960s, before long
front ends became popular (Larry explained during his first ''Biker Build-Off'', that he preferred nimbleness in a bike so he could ride at high speeds along the mountain switchbacks).
When building a chopper, Larry could draw upon what he had mastered over the years in the fields of mechanics, welding, and metal fabrication. Among custom bike builders, Indian Larry was known and respected for having mastered the old-school style of building and remaining loyal to it.
[Nichols; Cambridge. - p. 131-132.] Larry considered himself to be a "gearhead" originally, and was rooted in the
hot rod
Hot rods are typically American cars that might be old, classic, or modern and that have been rebuilt or modified with large engines optimized for speed and acceleration. One definition is: "a car that's been stripped down, souped up and ma ...
culture of the 1950s and 1960s. During the ''Biker Build-Off'' period in 2003–2004, Larry's appreciation for modern
horsepower
Horsepower (hp) is a unit of measurement of power, or the rate at which work is done, usually in reference to the output of engines or motors. There are many different standards and types of horsepower. Two common definitions used today are t ...
and twin
carburetors
A carburetor (also spelled carburettor or carburetter)
is a device used by a gasoline internal combustion engine to control and mix air and fuel entering the engine. The primary method of adding fuel to the intake air is through the Vent ...
for increased fuel/air intake was expressed in his builds.
Larry explained, "I'm a chopper builder. Old-time, old-school chopper builder. But I like the modern technology that's involved. So the bikes run better, perform better. And we have more fun with them."
In the art of building a bike, Larry preferred old school methods and didn't use
CNC machine
Computer numerical control (CNC) or CNC machining is the automated control of machine tools by a computer. It is an evolution of numerical control (NC), where machine tools are directly managed by data storage media such as punched cards or ...
s.
[Nichols; Cambridge. - p. 160.] He favored Paughco rigid frames and
panhead motors.
Larry liked being able to see all of the nuts and bolts and mechanics of a bike, rather than concealing those elements in a bike's construction.
The way that Larry approached building a bike was evident early on. The man who taught Larry the craft of using a welding torch said that he remembered Larry not wanting to
grind
A blade's grind is its cross-sectional shape in a plane normal to the edge. Grind differs from Blade#Knife blade profiles .28Patterns.29, blade profile, which is the blade's cross-sectional shape in the plane containing the blade's edge and ...
down welds if they were good because Larry "felt it showed your craftmanship."
Larry's childhood friend, Ted Doering, who knew Larry when he was first learning to build and would
chrome parts for him, said that Larry had even envisioned the idea for a "'clear,' see-through transmission case" in order to "view the gears working". Doering added that Larry "would fabricate or customize every piece because on a motorcycle, you can see everything."
Larry's shop partner, Paul Cox, (who first met Larry at Sixth Street Specials in the
East Village, and started working with him at Psycho Cycles around 1992)
explained how Larry conceived the idea for a new chopper build: "Working alongside him you realized how much he ran on instinct. Built-in instinct. He would rarely make a sketch or jot down notes...he just envisioned what he wanted in one wide-eyed flash and would turn to you with a look like he saw God. At that point it was 'all over but the cryin,' he would say."
Indian Larry appeared in ''Easyriders'' magazine in 1998 in an article entitled, "Hardcore NYC Troubadors". Later that same year the magazine profiled Larry with his motorcycle, ''Grease Monkey'', which won the 1998 Editor's Choice Award at the ''Easyriders'' Invitational Bike Show in
Columbus, Ohio, which was an important recognition by the biker world of Larry's talent.
[Nichols; Cambridge. - p. 70-71.]
The beginning of Indian Larry becoming known to the general public was his appearance in the Discovery Channel program, ''Motorcycle Mania II'' in 2001. The program's primary focus was on customizer
Jesse James
Jesse Woodson James (September 5, 1847April 3, 1882) was an American outlaw, Bank robbery, bank and Train robbery, train robber, guerrilla and leader of the James–Younger Gang. Raised in the "Little Dixie (Missouri), Little Dixie" area of M ...
, but it also featured different scenes profiling Indian Larry as he and the group (which included Jesse James, Chopper Dave, and Giuseppe Ronsin) set out to ride 1400 miles from
Long Beach
Long Beach is a coastal city in southeastern Los Angeles County, California, United States. It is the list of United States cities by population, 44th-most populous city in the United States, with a population of 451,307 as of 2022. A charter ci ...
, California to the
Sturgis 2001 Black Hills Classic in
Sturgis, South Dakota. When one of the choppers breaks down in Southern
Utah
Utah is a landlocked state in the Mountain states, Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. It is one of the Four Corners states, sharing a border with Arizona, Colorado, and New Mexico. It also borders Wyoming to the northea ...
, Larry is shown performing his mechanical skills on the bike in a supermarket parking lot (when his own bike has
magneto
A magneto is an electrical generator that uses permanent magnets to produce periodic pulses of alternating current. Unlike a dynamo, a magneto does not contain a commutator to produce direct current. It is categorized as a form of alternator, ...
problems, Larry explains to the camera, "If the bike is not running; if it's leaking oil; and if it's dirty. That's about the only three things that will really get to me.")
The program also shows Larry displaying his famous neck tattoo, sharing snippets of his personal philosophy, and doing riding stunts – this included him reclining back on his bike, ''Grease Monkey'',
with his legs outstretched over the handlebars, and standing up on the saddle with his arms outstretched to the side as he speeds down the highway. The group also visits Denver's Choppers in
Las Vegas
Las Vegas, colloquially referred to as Vegas, is the most populous city in the U.S. state of Nevada and the county seat of Clark County. The Las Vegas Valley metropolitan area is the largest within the greater Mojave Desert, and second-l ...
, Nevada (now in
Reno
Reno ( ) is a city in the northwest section of the U.S. state of Nevada, along the Nevada–California border. It is the county seat and most populous city of Washoe County, Nevada, Washoe County. Sitting in the High Eastern Sierra foothills, ...
) where Larry is shown meeting chopper builder,
Mondo Porras for the first time.
''Biker Build-Off''
Larry wanted to "elevate the art of the motorcycle" in the general perception and the art world.
He stated, "As far as I'm concerned, it is one of the highest art forms, because it combines all media: sculpture, painting, as well as the mechanics, and it's just a lot more than any one single medium"
(In addition to
metalwork
Metalworking is the process of shaping and reshaping metals in order to create useful objects, parts, assemblies, and large scale structures. As a term, it covers a wide and diverse range of processes, skills, and tools for producing objects on e ...
and painting, Larry included
engraving
Engraving is the practice of incising a design on a hard, usually flat surface by cutting grooves into it with a Burin (engraving), burin. The result may be a decorated object in itself, as when silver, gold, steel, or Glass engraving, glass ar ...
and
leather work to the list in another interview).
He explained that being a chopper builder requires being able to create from the abstract, and having a sense for
aesthetics
Aesthetics (also spelled esthetics) is the branch of philosophy concerned with the nature of beauty and taste (sociology), taste, which in a broad sense incorporates the philosophy of art.Slater, B. H.Aesthetics ''Internet Encyclopedia of Ph ...
, while also possessing mechanical skills to deal with "extremely critical tolerances...like 2/10,000 of an inch in the motors".
The ''
Biker Build-Off'' programs provided a public forum to do this. Indian Larry participated in three different ''Biker Build-Off'' programs on the Discovery channel:
The premise of each 45 minutes program was to profile two different custom motorcycle builders, each from a different part of the United States, and film them and their crews at work in their respective shops building a unique bike from start to finish within a set number of days. (They were given 30 days to build for Larry's first two ''Biker Build-Offs'', and 10 days for his third and final build for the program).
The format seemed perfectly suited to Larry, as television viewers witnessed segments showing the culmination of years of bike building experience interspersed with Larry's philosophical insights. Also shown helping Larry in the construction of each bike were Paul Cox and
Keino Sasaki (pronounced "cane-o") from his shop.
[Nichols; Cambridge. - p. 141, 142, 147.]
The bike builders would then meet at a neutral location and be filmed riding across several states to a particular bike show. The road trip was meant as a testing ground. Upon arrival at the bike shows, the general public in attendance could view the bikes and vote their preference between the two. Usually on the final day of a bike show, the votes would be tallied, a winner announced, and a trophy awarded. Indian Larry was voted the winner in all three ''Biker Build-Off'' competitions that he competed in. His second trophy was cut up and shared with his opponent,
Billy Lane and the audience, after Larry unexpectedly declared an exact draw after it was announced that he had won in the voting.
Indian Larry's fatal motorcycle accident occurred during the filming of his third ''Biker Build-Off'' in 2004, on the same day, and at the same bike show, where the votes were being tallied to determine the winner.
Last build: ''Chain of Mystery''
Indian Larry and crew built the ''Chain of Mystery'' bike for the final challenge. Larry said that the original idea for the bike's frame came to him in a flash of inspiration. He explained that his most creative ideas for a new build would flash across his mind in the form of an image, and then it would be his job to relentlessly chase that vision during a build until the image materialized in the finished product.
''Chain of Mystery'' utilized a frame concept that had never been done before.
Using a
jig
The jig (, ) is a form of lively folk dance in compound metre, as well as the accompanying dance tune. It first gained popularity in 16th-century England, Ireland, Scotland, and other parts of the British Isles, and was adopted on mainland Eu ...
as a guide, the heavy links of a chain, normally used for towing heavy vehicles, were welded together until the frame took shape (the shop's Eddie Mcgarry was the project welder). Since the frame is essentially the spine of the bike, any weaknesses in the welds could prove fatal, especially considering that Larry really pushed his bikes to perform when riding them.
As it turned out, the bike held up, and Larry rode the chopper to what would be his final bike show.
Personal life
Indian Larry considered himself a "lone wolf", and was not a member of a
motorcycle club
A motorcycle club is a group of individuals whose primary interest and activities involve motorcycles. A motorcycle group can range as clubbed groups of different bikes or bikers who own same model of vehicle like the Harley Owners Group.
There ...
, nor of what are termed
outlaw motorcycle club
An outlaw motorcycle club, known colloquially as a biker club or club (in Australia), is a motorcycle subculture generally centered on the use of Cruiser (motorcycle), cruiser motorcycles, particularly Harley-Davidsons and chopper (motorcycle ...
s.
Larry loved being on the road on his bike and living the biker lifestyle.
When Indian Larry first met the woman that would become his wife, Andrea "Bambi" Cambridge, in 1996, her first impression of him is that she thought he looked like "a total mass-murderer".
People would go out of their way to avoid him on the subway, but the moment Larry would start talking he'd instantly put them at ease with his sense of humor.
Bambi relates in the biography, ''Indian Larry: Chopper Shaman'', stories about how she first knew about Larry and the experiences that occurred before they came to be in a relationship. Before they officially started to date in 1997, they hung out together at a bar and Larry kept putting quarters in the
jukebox
A jukebox is a partially automated music-playing device, usually a coin-operated machine, that plays a user-selected song from a self-contained media library. Traditional jukeboxes contain records, compact discs, or digital files, and allow user ...
, playing romantic songs by
Roy Orbison
Roy Kelton Orbison (April 23, 1936 – December 6, 1988) was an American singer, songwriter, and guitarist known for his distinctive and powerful voice, complex song structures, and dark, emotional ballads. Orbison's most successful periods were ...
and
Patsy Cline
Patsy Cline (born Virginia Patterson Hensley; September 8, 1932 – March 5, 1963) was an American singer. One of the most influential vocalists of the 20th century, she was known as one of the first country music artists to successfully Cross ...
. This was when he was still drinking, and Bambi wrote that at one point he started crying, and said to her, "No one else is ever really going to know my soul". And Bambi thought to herself, "I will. I could do that."
Larry proposed to Bambi in the
Bahamas
The Bahamas, officially the Commonwealth of The Bahamas, is an archipelagic and island country within the Lucayan Archipelago of the Atlantic Ocean. It contains 97 per cent of the archipelago's land area and 88 per cent of its population. ...
. He surprised her by getting her name tattooed in
circus
A circus is a company of performers who put on diverse entertainment shows that may include clowns, acrobats, trained animals, trapeze acts, musicians, dancers, hoopers, tightrope walkers, jugglers, magicians, ventriloquists, and unicy ...
letters on his chest. When he showed it to her he said, "You know, you only have one girl's name tattooed over your heart in a lifetime." They had a circus themed wedding at
Coney Island
Coney Island is a neighborhood and entertainment area in the southwestern section of the New York City borough of Brooklyn. The neighborhood is bounded by Brighton Beach to its east, Lower New York Bay to the south and west, and Gravesend to ...
(Coney Island was where they were both involved with the
sideshow
In North America, a sideshow is an extra, secondary production associated with a circus, traveling carnival, carnival, fair, or other such attraction. They historically featured human oddity exhibits (so-called “Freak show, freak shows”), pr ...
. She performed as "Bambi the Mermaid", and Larry's act involved lying on a bed of nails while large blocks of ice would be broken over his chest by a girl with a sledgehammer; or she would stand on his stomach. The experience performing in front of audiences helped prepare Larry for his later appearances on camera and performing at bike shows). Larry's marriage to Bambi gave him a lot of strength, and gave him something to believe in.
Philosophy
Timothy White explained, "Larry lived his art. There's no doubt about it. His life was his art".
Having experienced and overcome many extreme tests in life, Indian Larry adopted the question mark as his life logo. Larry "had a lot going on in his head", and was by nature analytical, and a deep thinker. But ultimately he thought that one should just "roll with the mystery", and "live in the moment". Larry often expressed to those around him that he didn't pretend to know what was going on.
Basically applying the adage that wisdom is understanding what one doesn't know. Larry explained:
One of Larry's attributes that was well known to the public was his many tattoos, although he didn't have most of his tattoos until later in life (he got his neck tattoo when he was in his mid 40s in the mid-1990s).
The tattoo on his neck, which went across the front of his throat, was often commented on. The tattoo read:
The lettering of the middle two lines was in reverse so that it could be read in the mirror.
Larry said that it was his way to remind himself not to judge others and that revenge was not his job. When asked about its meaning during the ''Motorcycle Mania II'' program in 2001, Larry explained with a big grin on his face, "...it's my philosophy. Go through life see what's up. Try not to kill nobody!"
Larry often expressed his belief that life is "a really precious, short gift."
Film and television
Indian Larry was involved with acting, and performed stunt work for films. He appears in the documentary, ''Rocket's Red Glare!'', and performed stunts for the films, ''
Quiz Show
A game show (or gameshow) is a genre of broadcast viewing entertainment where contestants compete in a game for rewards. The shows are typically directed by a host, who explains the rules of the program as well as commentating and narrating whe ...
, Muscle Machine, My Mother's Dream, and
200 Cigarettes
''200 Cigarettes'' is a 1999 American comedy film directed by Risa Bramon Garcia and written by Shana Larsen. The film follows multiple characters in New York City on New Year's Eve 1981. The film features an ensemble cast consisting of brothers ...
''. He appeared on the ''
Late Show with David Letterman
''Late Show with David Letterman'' is an American late-night talk show hosted by David Letterman on CBS, the first iteration of the ''Late Show'' franchise. The show debuted on August 30, 1993, and was produced by Letterman's production com ...
'', among other appearances in film and television.
Death
In 2004, Indian Larry was living in the
East Village with Bambi, working at his shop in
Williamsburg
Williamsburg may refer to:
Places
*Colonial Williamsburg, a living-history museum and private foundation in Virginia
*Williamsburg, Brooklyn, neighborhood in New York City
*Williamsburg, former name of Kernville (former town), California
*Williams ...
, Brooklyn and was appearing at bike shows and rallies around the United States.
He was regularly being recognized and approached by fans. When interviewed for the Discovery Channel in July 2004, Larry said, "I just feel like that I'm maybe slightly starting to fit in somewhere and slightly starting to be accepted."
His friend Timothy White said: "It was finally making sense to him – all his turmoil, all his craziness...everything was just all coming together into this one moment of recognition that he was coming to..."
In August 2004, Indian Larry and crew participated in the third ''Biker Build Off'' competition building the chain frame bike, ''Chain of Mystery''. This time competing against Mondo Porras, whom he first met while filming ''Motorcycle Mania II'' in 2001 (Mondo, who began building choppers in 1967 with the late Denver Mullins in California, is known for his long down tube, stretch frame choppers. He and Larry had hung out together in Hawaii while appearing at a bike show there two months earlier).
[Nichols; Cambridge. - p. 159] Both bike builders met in
Pittsburgh
Pittsburgh ( ) is a city in Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, United States, and its county seat. It is the List of municipalities in Pennsylvania#Municipalities, second-most populous city in Pennsylvania (after Philadelphia) and the List of Un ...
, and then spent three days riding through Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Virginia, and North Carolina to arrive at the Liquid Steel Classic and Custom Bike Series bike show in
Concord
Concord may refer to:
Meaning "agreement"
* Harmony, in music
* Agreement (linguistics), a change in the form of a word depending on grammatical features of other words
Arts and media
* ''Concord'' (video game), a defunct 2024 first-person sh ...
, North Carolina, north of
Charlotte. Larry was scheduled to perform stunts at the event the afternoon of August 28, 2004, such as riding through a tunnel-of-flames.
Larry was always careful to build his bikes with aligned
geometry
Geometry (; ) is a branch of mathematics concerned with properties of space such as the distance, shape, size, and relative position of figures. Geometry is, along with arithmetic, one of the oldest branches of mathematics. A mathematician w ...
so that they did not veer to the side while riding down the road. One of the benefits derived from this level of bike stability is that it allowed Larry to perform his stunts on his own bikes, such as standing fully upright on the seat while speeding down the road.
This is a stunt Larry had done countless times over the years. After standing up while balancing himself, Larry would then outstretch his arms in a "T" configuration, called a "crucifix" pose. Larry rode through the tunnel-of-flames that afternoon in front of a crowd of several thousand people. A short time later, Larry attempted to perform the standing stunt again, this time on his bike, ''Grease Monkey''.
Larry had expressed apprehension that day about performing the stunt. Larry shared with Mondo that he did not have a good feeling about doing it, but he felt pressure to do it.
Bambi said that normally Larry did this stunt after the bigger stunts as "his way of blowing off steam...winding down."
As Larry was performing the maneuver, something went wrong and the front end of his bike started to wobble.
[Nichols; Cambridge. - p. 159, 160.] Rather than being able to jump down in the seat and regain control, Larry fell off the bike, hitting his head.
Larry sustained serious
head injuries
A head injury is any injury that results in trauma to the skull or brain. The terms ''traumatic brain injury'' and ''head injury'' are often used interchangeably in the medical literature. Because head injuries cover such a broad scope of inju ...
and he was airlifted to the
Carolinas Medical Center
Carolinas Medical Center, formally known as Atrium Health Carolinas Medical Center, is an 874-bed non-profit, tertiary, research and academic medical center located in Charlotte, North Carolina, servicing the southern North Carolina, northern So ...
in Charlotte. Indian Larry died from his injuries on Monday, August 30, 2004, at 3:30am.
He was 55 years old. The last words that Larry uttered were to his wife Bambi (who was at the event) saying, "Sweetie, sweetie."
Legacy
Fellow bike builder, Mondo said after Larry's death, "I think he humbled a lot of people because he was so real and genuine."
A tribute bike was built by
Billy Lane, Keino Sasaki, Paul Cox, and Kendall Johnson in the Indian Larry shop which was filmed by Discovery Channel for a one-hour biography special on the life of Indian Larry. The name, ''Love Zombie'', was chosen since this was a name that Larry had previously thought up for a future chopper he had wanted to build. Billy Lane hand-fabricated the gas tank, among the other contributions made by the team to build the bike
[Nichols; Cambridge. - p. 170-173.] (a vintage
Pontiac Pontiac most often refers to:
* Pontiac (Odawa leader) ( – 1769), Native American war chief
*Pontiac (automobile), a former General Motors brand
Pontiac may also refer to:
Places and jurisdictions Canada
* Pontiac, Quebec, a municipality
** Apo ...
car
hood ornament
A hood ornament (or bonnet ornament or bonnet mascot in Commonwealth English), also called a motor mascot or car mascot, is a specially crafted model that symbolizes a car company, like a badge, located on the front center portion of the Hood ...
of an Indian chief's bust was incorporated into the design of the gas tank). Robert Pradke of
Eastford, Connecticut applied purple paint with green flames.
Two books were published about Indian Larry in 2006:
*''Indian Larry: Chopper Shaman'' by Dave Nichols with Andrea "Bambi" Cambridge; photographs by Michael Lichter
*''Indian Larry'' by photographer Timothy White
References
{{Authority control
1949 births
2004 deaths
Desmedt, "Indian" Larry
Desmedt, "Indian" Larry
American bank robbers
Motorcycle road incident deaths
Desmedt, "Indian" Larry
People from Cornwall-on-Hudson, New York
People from Newburgh, New York