Timesuck with Dan Cummins - 273 - The Hells Angels

Episode Date: December 6, 2021

Did you know that Hunter S Thompson of Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas fame was one of the first people to bring national attention to the Hells Angels? Or that they were founded by soldiers returning home from World War 2? Or that a Marlon Brando movie in the 1950's also lead to growth of not just the Hells Angels but other Outlaw Motorcycle Gangs, as the US Justice Department likes to call them? Who are the real Sons of Anarchy? Big informative episode today about the Hells Angels, the history of motorcycles, and the rise of the MC - Motorcycle Club - in American culture (which was quickly exported internationally).  It's a gun-runnin', back your brother's play, keep the ride fast and tight on the freeway and keep the booze and drugs flowing when we make it to the end of the run edition, of Timesuck. The Bad Magic Productions charity for December is the Bad Magic Giving Tree! So far we have raised - thanks to so many of you - $44,160, and that money will give  176 kids from 177 families the best holiday of their lives! Thank you, thank you, thank you!!!! Watch the Suck on YouTube:  https://youtu.be/inJuCwGFI34Merch - https://badmagicmerch.com/  Discord! https://discord.gg/tqzH89vWant to join the Cult of the Curious private Facebook Group? Go directly to Facebook and search for "Cult of the Curious" in order to locate whatever current page hasn't been put in FB Jail :)For all merch related questions/problems: [e-mail] (copy and paste)Please rate and subscribe on iTunes and elsewhere and follow the suck on social media!! @timesuckpodcast on IG and http://www.facebook.com/timesuckpodcastWanna become a Space Lizard? We're over 10,000 strong! Click here: https://www.patreon.com/timesuckpodcastSign up through Patreon and for $5 a month you get to listen to the Secret Suck, which will drop Thursdays at Noon, PST. You'll also get 20% off of all regular Timesuck merch PLUS access to exclusive Space Lizard merch. You get to vote on two Monday topics each month via the app. And you get the download link for my new comedy album, Feel the Heat. Check the Patreon posts to find out how to download the new album and take advantage of other benefits.

Joshua O'Brien regained consciousness on July 12, 2020, inside the Cool Cats Tattoo Parlor in Englewood, Colorado, after being choked and beaten. His wrists and ankles were hogtied. He was bleeding. While members of Denver's Hell's Angels Motorcycle Club stood all around him, ready to lay more hurt upon his bruised and battered body if he should try and wriggle out of his restraints, shop owner and HA member Dusty Ulrich started blacking out O'Brien's deathhead tattoo. The hard-earned emblem signifying his membership in the Hell's Angels Motorcycle Club. Shop owner and HA member Dusty Ulrich started blacking out O'Brien's death head tattoo, the hard-earned emblem signifying his membership in the Hells Angels Motorcycle Club. On top of where the death head once lived, Ulrich used a real heavy hand to scrawl the word bad into O'Brien's skin as other Hells Angels photographed the ritual on their phones.

If you ever tell anyone about this, said Ulrich, I will fucking slit your throat. Despite the threat, O'Brien talked, and his throat has yet to be slit. He went to law enforcement five months after this incident, feeling betrayed by his former brothers. They'd beaten him and kicked him out after suspecting he was talking to law enforcement following a raid on his Lakewood motorcycle shop. But he hadn't talked. At least that's what he says. And because of what they did to him, he did end up talking. And based on his testimony, 14 Hells Angels members ranging from 30 to 81 years old were charged with violating Colorado's Organized Crime Act, along with a litany of

assault, burglary, and kidnapping charges. O'Brien gave investigators intricate details on the Hells Angels Denver chapter's involvement with stashed houses of meth, prostitutes, arms deals, and money laundering across the country. Is this the Hells Angels Denver chapter's involvement with stashed houses of meth, prostitutes, arms deals, and money laundering across the country. Is this the Hells Angels? Do they live up to the hype as a true organized criminal organization? It appears that some chapters certainly do, but maybe not all. O'Brien said, according to an arrest affidavit, if you want loves and hugs, you go to the Rocky Mountain chapter. If you want guns and drugs, you go to the Denver charter. you go to the Rocky Mountain chapter. If you want guns and drugs, you go to the Denver charter. The HA, the red and whites, H-A-M-C, the 81. The Hells Angels are certainly a feared organization and maybe a complicated, somewhat misunderstood bunch. Some are definitely true outlaws,

but maybe others are maybe more of the motorcycle enthusiast variety. I don't know. After absorbing all of this past week's info, I doubt any of their chapters are 100% on the up and up. I mean, why patch up for an outlaw motorcycle club if you're not going to get your hands at least a little bit dirty? The Hells Angels are the world's most notorious motorcycle club that some people,

mostly certain members, call a simple and misunderstood men's fraternity on two wheels of sorts, while others, especially many in law enforcement, call them definitely a full-fledged international criminal organization. The AHA is shrouded in myth and mystery. In many, if not damn near all minds, the name conjures up images of dudes you don't want to meet in an alley.

Burly, long-haired, bearded wild men wearing a lot of leather, covered in a lot of ink, probably a lot of scars from past brawls. Guys whose knuckles have been covered in someone else's blood a lot more than once. Guys not unused to warrants who've probably spent some hard time behind bars. Why do we have that image of the Hells Angels embedded in our collective consciousness? Who are they? How did they get here? The Hells Angels Motorcycle Club emerged a few years after World War II. Started small, over many years grew into a collection of both bike enthusiasts and American outlaws,

whose tales might be as grounded in legend as they are in fact. In just over 70 years, they've become a quasi-mythological part of American counterculture lore. American antiheroes, whose love of writing and hatred of rules has been exported to the rest of the world. Freedom lovers who don't just want Uncle Sam telling them how to live. Wanderers who'd rather die than not live life on their own terms. Some hard, hard men have been called hell's angels over the years. How dangerous are they still today? Is that recent Colorado beatdown common or the exception to the rule?

How many of them are there? Are they truly an example of organized crime, the mob on Harleys, or is their image mostly branding now? A bunch of guys, maybe tough guys, who want to look and feel even tougher, so they patch up and ride some cool-looking bikes. Today, we're talking about the world's most infamous outlaw, one percenter motorcycle club, the real sons of anarchy. Men famous or infamous for doing and selling tons of drugs, kidnapping, gun running, counterfeiting, money laundering, and partying harder than you or anyone you know has in their wildest days. Bar fights and orgies, leather, guns, and knives, and bikes, big, loud bikes, and lots of them. Vroom, vroom, motherfuckers. Let's step into the clubhouse. Try not to draw the ire of all those large,

scary-looking men sitting at the bar and dissect the hell's angels on a true crime, biographical, minimum 750cc edition of Time Suck. This is Michael McDonald, and you're listening to Time Suck. You're listening to Time Suck. Happy Monday! Welcome to the Cult of the Curious. Hail Nimrod. Protect us from Google's overlords, Lucifina.

Strike fear into the hearts of YouTube AI bots, Bojangles. And praise be to Triple M. You're never getting in trouble with YouTube. Not with that sweet voice and those wholesome lyrics. What's with the Google and YouTube talk? Well, we got suspended again briefly from YouTube, but we're back now. Just want to explain real quick on an episode of the Bad Magic show. We all share the same Bad Magic YouTube channel, Time Suck.

Sorry, Time Suck. I stand up, scared to death, and is we dumb? And on is we dumb, Joe and I talked about a porn parody website, furniture porn, lawn chairs chairs and sex positions. And a link to that site was in the episode description. And YouTube's AI bots thought we were linking to actual porn and gave us a strike in a two-week ban. But Reverend Dr. Joe appealed and they unsuspended us. So no more Furniture Porn.

Always getting in trouble with our modern masters, Facebook's Zuck. Whoever the hell runs fucking YouTube. That out of the way, so much show for you today. Excited to get into it all. Not trying to just keep cranking out back to back to back gigantic sucks. But there's just so much information to share.

One last tour stop for Stand Up This Fall, Tacoma this coming weekend. Not sure at the time of this recording if we added another show or not. If we didn't, it's all sold out. If we did, you can go to the ticket link at dancummins.tv to get over to the Tacoma Comedy Club. Hope I see you there. In the first half of 2022, lots of fun shows. Hollywood, La Jolla, aka San Diego, Austin, Texas, Orlando, Oklahoma City, Charlotte, Missoula, Montana, Tempe, Salt Lake City, New York, Chicago, California, Davenport, Mississippi. Those are not the right states for those cities.

You know where they are. Raleigh, Florida, Atlanta, Alaska. No, but those cities are right. Links to dates again at dancummins.tv. Sick holiday sweater in the store now At badmagicmerch.com Happy holidays, meat sacks To celebrate the season, we got a brand new retro-inspired

Holiday sweatshirt in store now Taking it in a little different direction this year Our art warlock, Logan Put together some pretty sweet patterns Moving away from a graphic-centric look of years past Trying to stay fresh Looks like an old- needle stitch sweatshirt and you can wear it whenever.

You don't have to let tradition tell you, you know, what you can do. Check it out now, badmagicmerch.com. One last announcement, the 2021 Bad Magic Giving Tree. We received $13,160 from fans. We'll give around $16,000 from Patreon. Lindsay and I are going to donate another $15,000.

Currently going to spend $44,160 on 77 families. Help a total of 176 kids have an amazing holiday. So thank you all. Can't thank you enough for helping us do this. It's a beautiful thing. And sorry we couldn't help more. Over 400 families submitted for aid this time. Sad sign of the times.

More than three times the amount that last year submitted. 2021. Been a lot harder on many than 2020 was. And 2020, you know, so hard for many. And then 2021 just fucking, you know, kicked them again. But almost 200 kids won't get the 2021 ass kicking they were going to get. Nimrod, so pleased about that. And now, let's fucking ride.

Our Patreon space listeners have spoken once again. This is a voted-in topic. They use their voting powers to steer TimeSuck into an examination of the Hell's Angels. So that's what we're doing today, of course. And I am glad. Lots to cover. Lots we'd love to cover, but can't definitively. The HA, pretty secretive group, who at different times in their history have punished

members pretty harshly for sharing secrets they weren't supposed to share with the outside world. So I'll share as much as I can for someone who is not a Hells Angel, willing to go into witness protection for doing so. Here's a quick overview of what we'll be covering. We'll start with a brief overview of the size and scope of the HA, including the type of crimes they seem to gravitate towards. Then we'll try and figure out how the Hells Angels name came about, followed by diving into the history of the American motorcycle, its relationship with, first, the American soldier, and the types of members joining emerging motorcycle clubs across the country, including the Hells Angels. Next, we'll examine Hells Angels membership structure and regulations. Quite a few rules for a group

of dudes who abhor rules. We'll learn about unique codes of conduct, some of the truths and myths of initiation, what all their important patches mean. Then it's timeline time. This week's Time Suck timeline will take us through some crazy points in American history. We're even going to meet gonzo journalist Hunter S. Thompson along the way. Before he wrote Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, his inside coverage of the Hells Angels, you know, put his name on the literary map and put their name on the counterculture cool map. Also in the timeline, we'll meet a man who is likely the most prolific Hells Angels hitman of all time. I certainly fucking hope so.

And before we meet him, we'll get to know Sonny Barger, a man many say is the architect of the club's rise to infamy and legend, the real founder of the Hells Angels, even if he didn't charter the first chapter. It's going to be a full throttle ride down the wide open road. Speed limit will be a mere suggestion,

happily ignored as we roll in a tight formation on a big run headed towards strong whiskey, wild women, hail to Safina, hard drugs, and probably a little bit of blood. Bojangles is fucking pumped for some reason. He told me if I start riding, he wants a sidecar. JK. He said he already has a hog. And if we ride together, I'm riding bitch. Fine. Okay, fine. Here we go. According to the Hells Angels themselves, they do strangely have a website. There are currently 467 charter chapters or clubs. You know, sometimes it's called charter, sometimes it's called chapters, sometimes it's called clubs, spanning 59 countries and across five continents.

But there are not that many active members, supposedly. Bunch of small chapters. It seems those chapters know a lot of associates though, right? Have a lot of dangerous friends. Don't let these numbers, you know, make you think they're tiny. The Hells Angels, pretty exclusive group, just over 800 patched in members in the U.S. currently, supposedly, and only around 2,500 members worldwide. At least that's as of 2017, according to Justice Department statistics. 10 years ago, the FBI estimated there were around 44,000 people in the U.S. belonging to groups authorities would call a motorcycle gang.

And these members were divided up into approximately 3,000 different gangs. About 500 large motorcycle gangs by MC standards, I guess, and 2,500 smaller, more disorganized gangs in the U.S. according to a 2015 CNN article. That 44,000 is out of over 12 million people according to 2018 stats who ride motorcycles, you know, just for the zen of it all, normies. I'm thinking of joining the normie ranks next summer.

I've been looking at some bikes lately. This week's research really got me excited, trying to figure something out, kind of carve out the time for it. I've been trying to become more efficient with my time working so I can enjoy more of that non-laptop, non-research life, that get out of the office life.

Get out in the world and do some stuff. And one of the things I've wanted to try for years now is riding a motorcycle. I had a little tiny one when I was a kid, but nothing serious. I never longed for it in my 20s and 30s. Loud bikes honestly irritated the shit out of me, but damn,

some of these bikes, they look sexy as hell now. Being out in the wind on a sunny day with no company other than my own thoughts, feeling all that horsepower between the thighs, going on a ride on a nice day with my Lucifina Linses, arms wrapped around my chest, sounds pretty nice. What model should I get? Some of those Harley street glides, especially, you know, one old murdered out. They look pretty fucking sick. Maybe a road glide, maybe a heritage classic, a little sexier, a little sleeker. I don't know. Indian Scout looks pretty sick too.

But can anything beat a Harley sex appeal? I don't know. The HA would say nothing beats a Harley. I look forward to having the free time to properly investigate and figure this all out. I'll tell you what I won't be doing no matter what bike I choose, and that's trying to patch in with some local chapter of a motorcycle club. To quote Danny Glover, a lethal weapon, I'm too old for this shit. I have no interest in risking going to prison for any fellow outlaw brothers when I inevitably get busted for running meth or something. While crime may not be a part of every single chapter, I think it is though,

it might be. I don't have proof though for a blanket statement like that. There is certainly a lot of proof regarding crimes committed from a wide variety of various Hells Angels chapters over the years. There's a path of HA related bodies and felonies thrown about from Turkey to Thailand to Australia to damn near everywhere in the world. A lot of bikers have died at the hands of rival bikers. Innocent people have died.

There's been riots. There have been some biker wars from small cities in California to the Nordic biker wars, plural, in Scandinavia. There have been biker, there's been biker-based horse shittery in every state in the US and in most major cities,

plus a lot of little ones, and in most of the countries around the world. The Wikipedia for the subject of HAMC criminal allegations and incidents, almost 740 sources. And it doesn't cover even close to everything. The closest chapter to our suck dungeon is in Spokane, Washington. Quick Google pulled up the feds

raiding their clubhouse in 2011. Here's a few excerpts. In recent years, the motorcycle club has been linked by authorities in Washington state to extortion schemes and murder. Three members of the Spokane chapter were convicted in 2007 of using the club as an organized crime ring, and some of its members have been tied to shootings and other violence throughout the western United States. In 2001, Ricky Warren Jenks, the club sergeant at arms and another man considered a club associate, were arrested in the shooting death of a man making methamphetamines in a Spokane Valley home. Jenks later pled guilty to second-degree manslaughter and was sentenced to 21 months in prison. Shortly after his release, Jenks was

arrested under a federal racketeering indictment. In a plea agreement, Jenks admitted to forcing a man to make regular cash and drug payments, then threatening him when he stopped paying. The man then paid Jenks $5,000 out of fear. In the 2011 FBI raid, all kinds of drugs and illegal weapons were confiscated. Clearly some crime being committed by some Hells Angels members. And in addition to the HA, there's a ton of crime being committed by, you know, just motorcycle clubs overall. The Department of Justice keeps track of a bunch of other groups, you know, slash motorcycle clubs like the Bandidos, Black Pistons, Mongols, Outlaws, Pagans, Sons of Silence, Vagos, Wheels of Soul, Satan Seeds, the Jokers, the Midnight Raiders, Suicide Soldiers, and the Cleveland Steamers. And maybe all those names starting with Satan's seeds

are fake motorcycle clubs that I just made up. I'm guessing most of you figured that out by the time I said Cleveland steamers, which is a crude sex act involving defecating on a lover's chest. I worry about people who enjoy it. No kink shame, just kink concern. But there are a ton of other motorcycle clubs out there. Many of them linked to a lot of criminal acts, just like the Hells Angels. Idaho is actually right up there with the most outlaw

biker gang members per capita of any state in the US, six plus outlaw gang members per 1,000 people. Note to self, be super nice to local biker dudes. Smile a bunch, but not too much. Be friendly, but not weird. We'll get into more outlaw biker gang criminal acts later, especially during the timeline. Right now, let's dig into some, the H.A. origin story. Hells Angels is a fucking cool name, right? Sounds super tough, but also maybe like, they're nice guys. Rough around the edges, but good at their core. You know, from hell, but also angels. Obviously meant to be intimidating. Where did it come from? One of the most popular theories is that the name comes from a 1930s,

or 1930, not the 30s, actually the year 1930, movie called Hell's Angels, produced and directed by Howard Hughes, another person we should suck one of these days. Hell's Angels was a blockbuster in its day, starring Jean Harlow, the original blonde bombshell, precursor to Marilyn Monroe, arguably the Depression era's brightest and sexiest big screen star. She died from kidney failure at only age 26 in 1937. But what a mark she left before she was gone. Hell's Angels was Barlow's big breakthrough row. Big breakthrough. My mouth is really not cooperating today.

Roll. big breakthrough. My mouth is really not cooperating today. Roll. She played the lead in an early epic action film full of aviation dogfights. Hughes himself actually crashed trying to film one of the stunts, had a skull fractured, needed facial reconstruction surgery during that movie. Three other pilots died filming stunts for the film, a movie about two British pilots and brothers in World War I. The movie is thought to have inspired a real group of pilots, two groups actually, to be called Hell's Angels in World War II. And one of those groups, maybe both, in some way inspired the Hell's Angels Motorcycle Club name.

But first, what would a Hell's Angel actually be? Let's take a few minutes to dig into what an angel of hell is supposed to be. I love learning about shit like this. In Abrahamic religions, fallen angels are angels who were expelled from heaven following a great battle between God and Lucifer that led to the very creation of hell and to Satan being in charge and to lots of demons

who've been fighting for the souls of mankind ever since. At least that's what many of us were taught. But did you know that the literal term fallen angel appears neither in the Bible nor in other Abrahamic scriptures? Yet it's used widely by many religious folks to describe angels cast out of heaven for sinning. Some longtime suckers may recall that translation problems with original biblical texts and later fictional works written

by writers like Dante, C. Inferno, led to how many of us view hell today, as opposed to actual biblical scripture. Same for Satan, falling from heaven, sent below to rule hell. That's not as clearly laid out scripturally as many seem to think it is today. Biblically, Satan's origin story comes primarily from a few passages in the book of Ezekiel and the book of Isaiah, two major prophetic books of the Old Testament. The book of Ezekiel is a recording of six prophecies given by a man named Theodore Stilwell Anderson, an accountant from Poughkeepsie with a mind for numbers and an eye for pencil skirts. J.K. Koshtay.

No, his name, of course, was Ezekiel. Believed by most Christians to have lived during the 6th century BCE, a Jewish exile living in Babylon. And here is his Satan prophecy. Chapter 28, verses 12 through 15. This translation belonged to the long-used King James Version, the old classic. Son of man, take up a lamentation for the king of Tyre and say to him,

Thus says the Lord God, You were the seal of perfection, full of wisdom and perfect in beauty. You were in Eden, the garden of God. Every precious stone was your covering. The sardius, topaz, and diamond, beryl, onyx, and jasper, sapphire, turquoise, and emerald with gold. The workmanship of your timbrels and pipes was prepared for you on the day you were created.

You were the anointed cherub who covers. I established you. You were the holy mountain of God. You walked back and forth in the midst of fiery stones. You were perfect in your ways from the day you were created till iniquity was found in you. By the multitude of the merchandise they have filled the midst of thee with violence, and thou hast sinned. Therefore I will cast thee as profane out of the mountain of God, and I will destroy thee, O covering cherub, from the midst of the stones of fire. Shit, it's so hard to follow.

Thine heart was lifted up because of thy beauty. Thou hast corrupted thy wisdom by reason of thy brightness. I will cast thee to the ground. I will lay thee before kings that thee may behold thee. Thou hast defiled thy sanctuaries by the multitude of thine iniquities, by the iniquity of thy traffic. Therefore will I bring forth a fire from the midst of thee. It shall devour thee.

And I will bring thee to ashes upon the earth in the sight of all them that behold thee. The last little part. Jesus. I know it was a lot, but I don't want to leave out any important devil details. Is all of that that you just heard describing a fallen angel, or is that just kind of the rambling, not trying to be offensive, but it's pretty rambling, prophecy of a dude who's clearly mad at some king, king of Tyre or something,

and he wants that guy to pay, you know, wants him to be destroyed and burnt and stuff. Rulers, we peasants have long ranted about their violent deaths. That's got to be one of the worst things about being a kingdom leader, actually. All the people who want you to die, and painfully. It's like these prophecies are believed to have been written during the Babylonian captivity, when a large number of Judeans from the ancient kingdom of Judah held as captives in Babylon, the capital city of the Neo-Babylonian Empire, following

their defeat in the Jewish-Babylonian War and the destruction of Solomon's Temple, a historical period lasting from 609 BCE to 515 BCE, when a lot of Jewish religious leaders had so much motive to be mad at a lot of the kings of that place in time, right? Now let's look at where Lucifer, hell's first angel, shows up in the book of Isaiah, another Old Testament book of prophecies, also believed to be written during that Babylonian captivity by a prophet named Jedidiah Justin Smalls Jr., known as Lil' JJ. Kidding again, of course. Written, obviously, by a prophet named Jedidiah Justin Smalls Jr., known as Lil' JJ. Kidding again, of course. Written, obviously, by a guy named Isaiah. And thought by most historical biblical scholars to be written about a despised Assyrian king. Here's chapter 14. This is less. Verses 12

through 15. How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning? How art thou cut down to the ground, which didst weaken the nations? For thou hast said in thine heart, I will ascend into heaven. I will exalt my throne above the stars of God. I will sit also upon the mount of the congregation in the sides of the north. I will ascend above the heights of the clouds. I will be like the most high. Yet thou shalt be brought down to hell to the sides of the pit. Is that Satan's origin story? Or another guy pissed off at another ancient ruler Ranting about how he's going to get it And God lays his vengeance upon him

A lot of ancient Jewish prophets Not happy with how they were treated by various kings back then Indicated by lots of talk of smitings And God's wrath And he's going to get this And he's going to get that Kind of talk Interesting

And Lucifer, not some random male name A translation of the morning star The planet Venus. Later in the New Testament, there are a few other Satan and hell references, such as in the book of Matthew, chapter 25, verse 41, depart from me, ye cursed into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels.

But most of our modern imagery about hell and fallen angels comes from Dante's Inferno and later fictional literary works, not from the Bible. Old mysterious verses reinterpreted, reimagined over and over, combined in our collective minds with fictional writings to build up a mythology of Satan, first of the fallen angels, leader of hell's angels. The main ancient origin for fallen angels is thought to be the book of Enoch, a collection of Jewish writings that didn't make it into the Torah or into the Old Testament written within 200 years of the birth of Christ. The book of Enoch contains unique

material on the origins of demons and Nephilim, right? Mysterious giants and musings on why some angels once fell from heaven. I'd share them, but I think I've shared enough strange cryptic verses. I've read a lot of them and none of them clearly spell out really much of anything, in my opinion. All this stuff comes across to a heathen like me as fever dream rantings or someone writing down what they're seeing while they're tripping balls

or suffering delusions brought on by some ancient undiagnosed mental illness, perhaps. But this is where the original hell's angel comes from. In the period immediately preceding the writing of the New Testament, some sects of Judaism, as well as many Christian church fathers, identified Nephilim as fallen angels, hell's angels. During the late second temple period, biblical giants sometimes considered the monstrous offspring of fallen angels, these Nephilim and human women. Sometimes the offspring

of the giants themselves thought to be the Nephilim. It's all very interpretive and pretty confusing. In these accounts, the Abrahamic gods sent the great deluge, the biblical flood. Deluge is how it's usually pronounced. It's to purge the world of these creatures and their bodies are destroyed, but their souls survive and now they forever roam the earth as demons. Okay, sure. Why not? I mean, as someone who believes in the paranormal on some level now, ghosts and stuff, I do think something else is going on in there, you know, demons, whatever. I guess their origin story could be anything. This one doesn't speak to me, but it speaks to many others. Modern Christian theology teaches that fallen angels are led by Satan and rebellion against

God. So the ultimate rebels, they rebel against God. Hard to get more outlaw than that. What a perfect choice. If you want to be a true outlaw, you know, biker group, biker gang, right? The ultimate rebels. Okay, that detour was longer than I originally anticipated. I'm just endlessly fascinated by the ancient religious origins of many of the things we modern humans believe in now. The Hells Angels Motorcycle Club founders. I highly doubt they were familiar

with all that shit that I just went over. They didn't come across like biblical scholars. It seems they got the name from a World War II bombardment group, also likely enjoyed the Satan Association, you know, bad boy. From squadrons to ships to bombs to planes, the soldiers have long loved cool-ass sounding names. And during World War II, there was a famous group that went by the Hells Angels,

the 303rd Bombardment Group. The 303rd Heavy Bombardment Group was activated February 3rd, 1942 at Pendleton Field, Oregon. After assembling and some advanced training on August 7th, 1942, they moved to Biggs Field, Texas to prepare for deployment. They arrived at Greenwich, Scotland September 10th, had their first combat mission flown on November 17th, 1942. And from then until April 25th, 1945, the group flew 364 missions, more than any other B-17 8th Air Force group, dropped just under 25,000 tons of bombs,

second most in the war behind the 8th Air Force. 9,000 men would serve as these Hells Angels. Many of them would die. The group lost a total of 165 aircraft. Their motto, might in flight. Hells Angels name has some pretty interesting roots. The Hells Angels website answers the origin of their name as follows, assigning inspiration to some different 1940s Hells Angels, saying to answer the questions of lineage between H-A-M-C and a military organization is that Arvid Olsen was a member of the Flying Tigers Hells Angels, fighter pilot squadron from the First American Volunteer Group that fought against Japan on behalf of China right before World War II.

And he gave the idea of using that name to the actual founder of the first Hells Angel Motorcycle Club in Fontana, California. The selection of our colors, red and white, is a result of the association of Olson with the HAMC founders. The insignia of the HAMC, our copyrighted death head, can also be traced to two variant insignia designs, the 85th Fighter Squadron and the 552nd Medium Bomber Squadron. Frank Sadlik, past president of the HAMC San Francisco chapter, designed the official death head insignia. Frank was the president of that chapter from 1952 to 19, 1955 to 1962. So many numbers.

He wore a skull earring carved of ivory that sat on his father's nightstand for years. When his dad died from suicide, when he was a teen, he took that, wore it, and used it as inspiration for the Hells Angels deathhead. So the name of Hells Angels comes from the military, as does its deathhead insignia. And the guys who named either the 303rd or the First American Volunteer Group, the Hells Angels, possibly got that name from the Howard Hughes movie. And the Hells Angels have even more connections to the military than their name and insignia. The whole motorcycle club craze that broke out in America after World War II

and the motorcycles themselves have military roots. The popularity of the American motorcycle was no doubt forged in the fires of the Second World War, as was the camaraderie the soldiers would seek to rekindle from motorcycle clubs after the war. Motorcycles had begun to be used by the U.S. military a few decades prior to WWII. As far back as 1916, sidecar-equipped motorcycles had been used by the U.S. during its attempts to hunt down Pancho Villa and its forces at the U.S.-Mexico border. The first motorcycles were basically steam-powered bicycles. Did not look super cool. If those were still in use, there would not be outlaw motorcycle clubs today, just like there is not outlaw razor scooter clubs or outlaw Segway clubs, which would be pretty

fucking awesome if that was the real thing. The first of these steam-powered bicycles showed up in France in 1867. First model topped out at a top speed of about nine miles an hour. And it looked like you had to be real careful not to burn the shit out of your leg when you were riding it. The first mass produced early motorcycle shows up in 1894, the four stroke Hildebrand and Wolfmuller. This thing looks like a motorcycle,

not exactly a speed demon, but it could get up to 28 miles an hour. British motorcycle manufacturer Triumph gets in the game in 1902. They have some sexy looking bikes. In 1903, they sell around looking bikes. In 1903, they sell around 500 bikes. America enters production, not with the Harley-Davidson, but with Indian motorcycle manufacturing company founded in 1901. They'll kick out over 500 bikes

in 1902. And then Harley-Davidson, they'll start producing bikes in 1903, right? The pride of Milwaukee. Motorcycle racing now takes off as a new sport. Soon, certain models are reaching speeds of 60 miles an hour. World War I kicks motorcycle production way up. Americans and the British start using motorcycles to relay messages to supply effective communications to frontline troops. Previously, horses were being used and horses are fucking pissed. Their jobs have been outsourced, mechanized. Or maybe they're super happy just to go get, you know, they can just go eat apples and fuck and do horse stuff far from the front lines now. Military police start using motorcycles as well.

Harley-Davidson picks up the most contracts of any U.S. motorcycle company and devotes 50% of its total production to military use in World War I. The war really popularizes both Triumph and Harley-Davidson bikes, more so Harleys. By 1920, Harley-Davidson has become the world's largest motorcycle manufacturer, with their motorcycles being sold by dealers in 67 different countries.

And until 1931, Indian and Harley-Davidson, the only two American manufacturers producing commercial motorcycles. Shortly before World War II breaks out, you know, things move along even faster. These bikes. 1937, Joe Petrali sets a new land speed record of 136 miles per hour on a modified Harley,

61 cubic inch, 1000 cc overhead valve driven motorcycle. Then World War II happens. World War II, bad for most of the world, very good for motorcycles. During the Second World War, in the early years of the war at least, motorcycles were seen by all nations as an easy and comparably cheap way to grant the infantrymen and scouts mobility in a small and easily transported package, especially important for paratroop airborne units, which were highly limited in what gear they could transport into enemy territory. Throughout the war, both Allied and Axis forces deployed motorcycles in every theater of the conflict.

World War II motorcycles used in all kinds of missions. Motorcycle ride messengers proved to be a vital part of making sure that messages could be quickly delivered, especially when radio became unreliable due to interference and spy games fuckery. In other cases, sidecar-equipped motorcycles were used to transport cargo, infantry, or injured soldiers. Motorcycles were also commonly used to escort convoys and assist with scouting operations. Although the prevalence of Jeeps

and armored vehicles in World War II made the use of motorcycles in direct combat operations less common than it was in the first World War. By 1942, Harley-Davidson again getting a bunch of military contracts producing more than 29 000 motorcycles per year mostly for the u.s army for the military produced the wla model aka the liberator which sounds to me uh like a vibrator or some other sex toy

halo safina but is a motorcycle but that name probably has been used by some company for vibrating sex toy of some sort. The WLA, based on an earlier civilian model, the WL, A stands for army, and the Liberator, unmodified, keep picturing a vibrator, could get up to 60 miles per hour. A lot of Harley Davidson WLAs still out there today, one from 1942 in excellent condition, that'll fetch you around $33,000. On the cold-ass tundras of the Eastern Front, both Russian and German forces made extensive use of motorcycles in and out of battle. And since America was fighting along the Soviets during World War II, Harleys sold to them as well. In fact, so many WLA bikes sold to USSR, or to the USSR, that Russia became an important post-war

source of spare parts for American Harley motorcycle owners. BMW was making the Germans' bikes during the war, and with BMW long being an amazing automobile manufacturer, the R71 they made for the Nazis was better than the Harley WLA in many ways. Late in the war, Harley-Davidson, they took the best design features from some recovered R71s, created the cutting-edge Harley-Davidson, they took the best design features from some recovered R71s, created the cutting edge Harley-Davidson XA for the military, moved a little faster, 65 miles an hour, better in some other ways. But not a lot were made because by the end of the war, the military was growing less interested in motorcycles. The ever-advancing Jeep eclipsed the need for new motorcycle designs. Fewer than a thousand of the XA were produced, but several XA design features would

live on in later Harley-Davidson models ridden by early Hells Angels. XA is now one of the most sought-after vintage Harley-Davidson motorcycles of the post-war era. Looks like they're still around for about $30,000 a piece as well. Following World War II, motorcycle use booms in the U.S. Unlike Europe's cities and factories, America had not suffered through any wartime damage, and subsequently, its factories were able to quickly kick out whatever shit people wanted to buy after the war. And people wanted to buy motorcycles. While some motorcycle clubs had existed before World War II, two main factors resulted in their explosion after the war. The first, a vast number of war surplus motorcycles, now available for a very low price due to the demobilization of much of the American military.

In some cases, former soldiers able to bring back the very motorcycles they'd ridden on in the war. In other cases, former soldiers purchased newly built, never used motorcycles at near scrap metal prices. Because of this, motorcycle clubs in America opened to a wide range of individuals. There was no barrier of a high-priced bike standing in any veteran's way. Second reason motorcycle use exploded is the commonly known symptom of war that many former soldiers find themselves having, you know, when they find themselves having difficulty assimilating back into civilian life, or this thing hinders their assimilation. Oh my God, assimilation! And that is PTSD, post-traumatic stress disorder.

At the time, people were often dealt with prejudice for it. Non-vets just didn't understand what vets had been through. Many vets craved both the excitement and sense of brotherly camaraderie that they'd known during their time overseas. Perhaps the structure of rank and file as well was craved. A motorcycle provided them with the freedom to explore America's roads, while the growth of motorcycle clubs and outlaw gangs provided them with the same wartime camaraderie and rank hierarchy they were craving. By associating with other veterans, these new bikers could gain the social support of a group who understood each other in a way that few others could. This also kind of automatically

made these clubs pretty, you know, exclusively male since only men were getting battlefront experience back then. Motorcycle club or culture, motorcycle culture now takes off in America. War surplus and newly manufactured bikes alike soon found themselves modified to better suit their riders needs and desires. Babas, babas are what the cool kids are riding now.

What all the aces and dream boats and dolly dizzies are using to attract all the hottest cookies and broths. If you want a grandstand and put a little hot diggity dog in your jitterbug, you get a bobber. Or you can go belly up and get your chops busted and end up standing on the curb with the geezers and the drips like a fathead whistling Dixie. All that shit I said actually does make some sense. A bobber motorcycle is not a type of motorcycle, but simply a style of custom motorcycle in an effort to make the motorcycle lighter and faster. Anything that is seen as extra or unnecessary on a,

on a bike is taken off to reduce the weight, give it a minimalistic look and just to make it look fucking cool. That's probably the most important part. The name comes from the short, from shortening the rear fender, which is bobbed as in a bobtail, those classic sons of anarchy bikes, right? Those are bobbers or bob jobs as they're sometimes called. They don't look that cool straight from the factory, or at least they didn't used to.

Now you can buy a bike called, for example, a Harley Davidson Street Bob 114 stripped down bike, made for customization. Bobbing became the thing to do in the post-war era. Remove an extra weight, impose speed and performance while adding decorative touches such as chrome plating, various types of paint jobs, allow the owner to customize the motorcycle to suit their own desires. Right, fast, loud, cool as hell. Vroom, vroom, motherfucker, vroom, vroom. Tough guys with the most moxie, getting real into bikes, stylizing them, you know, making them their own. The chopper,

you've probably heard that term for a bike, is a more stylistically and technically extreme evolution of the Bob job, which emerged after the highly elaborate, heavily chromed Bob jobs that appeared in the late 40s and 50s. The term chopper did not appear in print until the mid 60s, over 30 years after the Bob job was invented. Chopper's very popular in Hell's Angels riding culture. And with all these cool bikes being ridden now, cool riding clubs bound to spring up. There were clubs before, but nothing like the Hell's Angels, the Mongols, the Cleveland Steamers. Come on. Pre-WW2 clubs full of drips and geezers.

The American Motorcyclist Association. The AMA, founded in 1924, focused on promoting a professional and family-friendly image. But in the post-war era, more than a few of the new motorcycle enthusiasts chafed at some of the restrictions of these clubs. And in the aftermath of the 1947 Hollister Riot, huge historical moment for the one percenter outlaw culture, a growing number of bikers ignored the AMA and their clubs became known as outlaw motorcycle gangs, OMGs, the original OMGs, the OMG OGs. Not just an acronym from the emoji world, not just something the easily outraged often type. An official statement

from the AMA over the Hollister riot claimed that the riot had been caused by only 1% of the bikers present, leading to some groups later like the HA and other outlaw MCs, to identify themselves as one percenters. A badge of honor for the chosen few. We'll get into the Hollister Riot a bit more in the upcoming timeline. World War II's motorcycles did not simply carry American soldiers to victory from North Africa to France. They also helped form post-war motorcycle culture in America. Now let's explore these outlaw MCs, these outlaw motorcycle gangs, these OMGs, these OGOMGs. Here's how the U.S. Justice Department defines these groups. Outlaw motorcycle gangs, OMGs, are organizations whose members use their motorcycle clubs as conduits for criminal enterprises. motorcycle clubs as conduits for criminal enterprises.

OMGs are highly structured criminal organizations whose members engage in criminal activities such as violent crime, weapons trafficking, and drug trafficking. There are more than 300 active OMGs within the United States, ranging in size from single chapters with five or six members to hundreds of chapters with thousands of members worldwide. The Hells Angels, Mongols, Bandidos, outlaws, and Sons of Silence pose a serious national domestic threat and conduct the majority of criminal activity linked to OMGs, especially activity relating to drug trafficking

and more specifically to cross-border drug smuggling. But no OMG is more feared than the Cleveland Steamers. Holy shit! Not since the days of Prohibition-era gangsters has a homegrown criminal organization struck so much fear into the hearts of law enforcement. Cleveland Steamer primary charter president

Miguel Tuts Martinez has been described as a modern-day Al Capone in many sources. Tuts has been linked to everything from the 1993 Bronx sewer bombing that created an environmental disaster New York State is still dealing with today to the 2007 Pasadena sanitation hijacking that left hundreds of thousands without basic sewage and plumbing needs for five straight weeks. Both of these attacks and others thought to be diversion strikes, distracting law enforcement, allowing the gang to traffic large amounts of narcotics or something like that.

Obviously, I'm making all that up about the Cleveland Steamers. But what the Justice Department said about the Hells Angels, Mongols, and others, that's true. They continue writing, because of their transnational scope, these OMGs are able to coordinate drug smuggling operations in partnership with major international drug trafficking organizations. The criminal activity that is largely connected with OMGs are things like motorcycle thefts, prostitution, money laundering, gang violence, illegal weapons, and more than anything, narcotics trafficking, at least historically, but probably still not too. Okay, for this next bit, let's put ourselves in the shoes of a dude who's thinking about

joining a motorcycle club like the Hells Angels. Imagine that your moral compass can handle all the possible outside the law shit law, you know, shit. And that you have the kind of ass that loves to sit on a motorcycle for days on end. You're willing to make everything and anything else in your life. Secondary to your love for and commitment to your hell's angels chapter. And that commitment will be expected to remain until death. How do you actually join the HA on many HA affiliated websites?

The answer to that query is, if you have to ask that question, you probably won't understand the answer. Not a promising start to your quest, if you're asking that question. You'll need to first figure out how to ride your bike and ride it very well. Don't even start this quest unless you've been riding for thousands of hours and know how to modify your Harley and all that. This group is not for the casual rider. And don't be in a hurry to join. Membership does not happen overnight. It generally takes years to become accepted as a member. So what kind of bikes should you have if you want to join? Most American outlaw bikers ride Harley-Davidson's.

Hell's Angels certainly do. It's actually a membership requirement. There is a provision that allows other brands of bikes as long as Harley-Davidson owns them to be ridden, like Buell. Buell Motorcycle out of Grand Rapids is an example of one of these brands. But best not to fuck around with anything other than a Harley. Don't be a fucking geyser, don't be a geyser drip boomer stick in the mud, nerd type person. Uh, gotta be cool, man.

Harleys are cool. In many outlaw circles, you have to build or modify your bike too. No straight off the floor models are allowed. And you should be able to do all that modification yourself. You gotta really know your bike. You gotta really know the floor models are allowed. And you should be able to do all that modification yourself. You got to know, you got to really know your bike. You got to really know your way around a bike. And why the loyalty to Harley Davidson?

Well, because all that World War II era stuff we talked about. Because of their popularity after the war. It's all about tradition. Because that's what the original HA writers wrote. Or HA members wrote. Early HA members were almost exclusively vets. And their sense of patriotism extremely high after the war. And from their perspective,

buying non-American made bikes, just not patriotic. The style of bike that most long haul outlaw bikers choose is cruisers. The Harley cruisers offer the kind of comfort that allows for long trips on the open road. Perfect for the biker lifestyle. The HA lives. They offer more horsepower, more torque

and smaller commuter bikes. Are Harleys the best bikes out there? No, actually. There are faster bikes than Harleys, more comfortable, cheaper to repair, bikes that handle better. But that shit doesn't matter to a biker that sees his club as his family

and his bike as his home and his status symbol or a symbol of belonging. We found this quote from one such biker. The hog is about more than speed or flashiness. It's about faith, respect, and honesty. Okay. Strength of character, the strength to remain true to one's real beginnings.

All right. I've heard from a few Harley Davidson aficionados about this special pride they take in riding them. You know, they don't have the most perks, are apparently known to break down more than some other brands, are expensive to fix, but because of their image,

because of the tradition, a lot of riders would ride nothing else. God, Harley has to love that kind of loyalty. You can't buy that. Holy shit. So again, if your ambition is to become a full-fledged red and white highwayman, first you go get a Harley Cruiser or touring bike, and you ride the fuck out of it. For years, you customize it, you know how to work on it. How much is that going to cost?

Harley has tons of models, starting with the Softail Standard. It begins at around $13,000. You can spend over $40,000 on a newer Harley if you want, but it's probably going to be some cushy, extra comfy model that doesn't have that raw, real men don't need fancy shit outlaw feel. Your average Harley Davidson likely to have a top speed of about 150 miles an hour. For comparison, a crotch rocket, super sport motorbike can get to 190 miles an hour and beyond. But again, it's not about being the fastest.

It's about being the coolest. And you also want something comfortable to ride. With the Hells Angels, the rumor is that if you ride less than 20,000 miles a year, you lose your membership. I'm sure that's probably kind of a joke, but they do ride a ton. And like I said earlier, once you join an MC,

your personal business comes as priority number two, and you're going to be riding with them all the time. When it comes to official rides, you have to go on them. If you want to stay in the HA. Priority number one in life is club activities. And road runs are some of the most important club activities. Probably going to ride pretty fast on a lot of these rides too. If keeping a perfect driving record,

never getting a speeding ticket is a big, important life goal of yours, don't fuck around with the HA or any other outlaw club. You're going to ride fast, often. You're going to ride tight, side by side, little following distance between riders. Sonny Barger, man sometimes called the godfather of the HA, wrote a book on how to survive a ride with true bikers called Let's Ride, Sonny Barger's Guide to Motorcycling, How to Ride the right way for life. Some of his tips include don't ride when angry, okay? Don't ride when drunk or on drugs. You know, don't believe in other drivers' turn signals.

And, you know, not riding a difficult-to-see black motorcycle, not learning to ride from a friend are important points as well. Seems like pretty common sense stuff. I think it's pretty funny that he says you shouldn't ride a difficult to see black motorcycle even though most Harleys are black. Okay, okay. So that's one perspective on how to ride properly and safely. Toots Martinez from the Cleveland Steamers provided some very different advice

in his book on how to ride with true bikers called Toots Martinez Keep It Steamy How to Ride and Live Like an Outlaw. And Toots says the key to surviving a long ride is to drink only water and only before and after a long ride. Otherwise you pee too much. So that's solid advice. And he also says, don't eat Hot Pockets or gas station burritos or stuff with a lot of sour cream or grease in it before or during a ride, because that shit's going to fuck your stomach

up big time. And if you shit yourself, you're going to make the ride harder, not just for you, but for other riders riding behind you. So that's another perspective on how to ride properly and safely. A lot of solid, sage advice from some wise men. Now that we have a bit of understanding as to why former soldiers had the desire to band together and form the first motorcycle clubs and why they were loyal to a certain brand, let's talk more about who gets to be a biker. The average motorcyclist today joining a motorcycle club, likely to be in their mid to late 40s, likely been riding for many years. That's what a lot of biker websites say. But those sites seem to be lumping in non-outlaw clubs, you know, with OMGs.

Anecdotally, based on reading a fair amount of articles on crimes committed by outlaw bikers over the past few decades, dudes in their 20s and 30s seem to be most of the guys joining organizations like the AHA. And it is dudes. Almost all motorcycle club members are men. In the AMA, roughly 95% of the member riders are men. There are also straight, mixed, even transsexual female riding clubs and motorcycle clubs, but those clubs are not the OMGs. No outlaw 1%er MC would currently let a female rider ride a motorcycle in their run formations unless they're sitting on the back of a bike. It just doesn't happen. Hell's Angels do not have female members. Very taboo. Female participation is limited to women referred to as old ladies, sweeties, sweet butts, or house mouses. Women are primarily viewed in HA culture as sexual objects. They can hang around the

clubhouse. They can be present at rides. They can raise kids. They can be acknowledged as an old lady of so-and-so, you know, a person not to be fucked with or hit on by other members. But when it comes to essential club activities, meetings, actual participation, nope, fucking get out. Also mostly white dudes when it comes to the Hells Angels and a fair number of other OMGs. You're going to have a hard time finding any black comes to the Hells Angels and a fair number of other OMGs. You're going to have a hard time finding any black members of the Hells Angels, at least in the States, but the club insists they are not a racist group, but many disagree, myself included. According to a one percenters website within the United States, it is extremely unlikely that you will ever see a black American Hells Angel member,

although within the USA, yeah, within the USA, but there are patched members of other origins, including Hispanic and Native Americans. Having said that, many chapters within America will still party with and do business with black Americans. It is just that they will not be patched in as an angel. If you look internationally to some of the European Hell's Angels chapters, there are looser Hell's Angels race requirements for entry and evidence of black members, as well as a mix of many races. Sonny Barger stated in a BBC interview in 2000 that the club as a whole is not racist, but we probably have enough racist members

that no black guy is going to get in it. So they are kind of a racist organization as a whole. At that time, the club had no black members. Why aren't there any black Hells Angels? No one seems to have a good answer for that. You know, other than early members in the States were racist, they voted in later members who tended to be racist and so on and so on. And they just do not give a fuck about being PC.

From what I can tell, they seem to embrace being sexist and racist in a way. Right? Part of not following society's rules. And I guess no one's really felt like challenging the old mindset on this. So sorry, Black Meets Axe, not becoming a member of the Hells Angels anytime soon. You can let them know you hate that, but I don't think they'll care. They don't seem to be the kind of dudes

to entertain complaints of any kind. That was a whole storyline, or there was a whole storyline, actually, about racism of this sort on the Sons of Anarchy. That show does seem to be grounded in a lot of truth from what I read, actually. Show creator, Kurt Sutter,

spent a lot of time with various Hells Angel chapters conceptualizing that show, including Sonny Barger. Also a no-tolerance policy for Hells Angels membership if you've ever worked in law enforcement, including as a prison guard. Not sure if it's cool to join if you worked as like a janitor or handyman at some prison or something. If you're ever a security guard, odds of getting in real low. Dog catchers might be okay.

What about a dress code? How should you dress if you want to join? No dress code, but you can easily dress the wrong way. Probably don't want to show up to the biker bar hoping to become a hang around wearing like Birkenstocks and capri pants, Duran Duran vintage concert tee, All Lives Matter baseball hat. Definitely not going to get considered for membership. Will be considered for having your ass beat. The traditional Hell's Angel attire is leather vests, their legs sheathed in denim jeans. You know, but watching some Hell's Angels docs, I've seen these guys wear all kinds of shit. Everything from stuff that makes them look like they're riding to a BDSM kind of meetup to other stuff that looks like they're trying to become the next QAnon shaman. Boots seem to be the preferable

foot attire. Not a lot of flip-flops in the HA crowd. Helmets historically were not worn, but modern riding laws make it pretty stupid not to wear one now. You're just making it real easy for a highway patrol officer to have a good reason to pull you over. The vest sometimes called a cut, that's everything. Most important piece of attire. We'll get more into that in a little bit here. And who do you approach to become a member? What kind of leadership structure do the Hells Angels have? Well, most motorcycle clubs have similar internal leadership positions and ranking. If you've ever seen a group of Angel members riding down the street,

you've likely noticed how organized they are. The bikers ride in a particular order and it signifies seniority. They ride the same way they do business. At the top is the organization's president, aided by his second command and the vice president. After these two is the club secretary, treasurer, sergeant at arms, and then the road captain. Then there's the rest of the patched members, then prospects at the back of the formation with any associates or hangarounds if they've been invited, if they've been invited, right at the very back. The president, while the top dude, not a ruler or boss, not in theory. He's the club CEO

who chairs their executive committee, but he doesn't make decisions leaning on his own understanding or interests. He's been elected to keep the club in order, act in the best interest of the MC and his members. He doesn't vote, make motions, or second them. He is allowed to vote, well, only in the case of a tie, or if something else results or some of the results depend on his vote. Down from the leaders is the ordinary full-patch members. Under them are prospects, hopeful members whose membership possibility has not been voted on yet. And under the prospects are the hangarounds with long-term hangarounds sometimes being called associates. In some clubs, the top most leader is the founder followed by the president down to the hangarounds. There is a little variance, which makes sense. These guys identify as outlaws. They don't want to follow rules.

So hard to get all of them to organize really cohesively. A little bit about the positions other than president now. The MC road captain has one significant role, making sure that road runs are successful. He's the final law when it comes to runs and is usually a non-voting member. He researches, plans all the club road runs, the routes, the intermediate stopping points during the actual road run. The word from the captain's mouth is absolute law. Not even the president or vice president can question he's the boss. The captain must be well aware of the landmarks in the selected route, including repair shops, hotels, other relevant markers. The secretary keeps club records, takes minutes during meetings.

Uh-huh. I bet a lot of those are probably not taken or they're just like thrown away. Don't want to leave evidence. The treasurer is in charge of the motorcycle club funds, i.e. money from selling drugs and guns and stuff. Also the custodian of the club assets

like unissued patches. The sergeant at arms ensures the club's bylaws are adhered to. The guy who does the most killing in the chapter, if they're doing any killing, seems to often be the sergeant at arms.

The vice president will fill in for the president if he isn't available. Also sometimes relay messages from other members to the president and take lead on tasks the president assigns him. Back to being someone who wants to join again. So you want to join the AHA still. Who are you? Well, you're definitely not black. You probably don't have a lot of respect for women. You're willing to dedicate your life to a motorcycle club above all else, including any kids you have

or will have. So you're probably not a good parent. You're probably a fucking dirtbag who loves Harleys, beating the fuck out of people who are different from you, and you hate law enforcement. You're super cool. You're a super cool guy who's probably white and also probably has long hair, beard, tattoos that look like prison tattoos if you didn't actually get them in prison. Fucking awesome. There are apparently usually four steps for this kind of person when it comes to HA membership. Most other outlaw motorcycle clubs have similar steps. First step is to become the hang around I mentioned. Being a hang around is a lot like what it sounds like.

Basically, you hang around places that the Hell's Angels hang around. You find some HA members and you hope they invite you to their clubhouse for a little get together. To become an official hang around, you have to get invited by members of a chapter to an HA event. And then if they think you're cool,

they'll invite you to more events. You know, like, hey, this is Tony. I know his tan and his hair is curly, but he's for sure not black. He showed me his 23andMe results, and he doesn't really care about women. He showed me naked pics of his girl on his phone. She asked him not to show anyone,

and he's been in prison, and he's not a fan of cops. So he's fucking totally cool. I think we should let him hang around. I like him. Once you become a hang around, now you get to meet some of the other members and get a feel for what this lifestyle may have to offer you. The other Hells Angels MC members will be watching.

They'll be judging your character. So you don't want to say shit like, there was no real Lakers-Celtics rivalry. Magic Johnson was way better than Larry Bird. Or who's my favorite NASCAR driver? Bubba Wallace, easy. Or Harleys are okay, but they just don't compare to Hondas. So much more bang for your buck, and I prefer the way they look.

Or you don't want to say like, I hope Kamala Harris runs for president in 2024. About time a woman gets put in charge. No, remember, you got to keep it white, keep it dude, keep it Harley. The HA way. You might end up being a hang around for years. The whole point is to impress a member enough for them to notice and bump you up to the next level of associate. When you're an associate,

you basically just, you're just a fucking glorified hang around. You can get stuck a few more years, this level, attending some of the events, spending time with more of the members, members continue to evaluate you. Eventually you stop getting invited to,

you know, hang around or you get upgraded to be a prospect. Prospect is like a hell's angels intern. Once you're made a prospect, you're allowed to be a prospect. Prospect is like a Hells Angels intern. Once you're made a prospect, you're allowed to attend a lot more events. However, you will not be able to place any votes on Club Matters, and there may also be some meetings that you're not allowed to attend. While you're a prospect, chapter members really are watching you, trying to determine if you should be patched in for lifetime membership. Now you're in the pack on rides, still towards the back, but in the pack. Next is the final step.

After however long it takes for you to impress enough members to be truly considered for membership, the chapter members hold a vote. All the members of the chapter you're trying to join must vote unanimously for you to become a member. If they don't, a prospect you will remain. Or if someone raises any serious concerns,

you might just be done with your time around the chapter. With the H-8, it seems to usually take around five years, at least five years to go from being hang around to full member. In addition to the voting, there may also be other requirements made of the prospect in order to become a fully patched member. However, due to the secrecy of a lot of these clubs, those can't be confirmed. People speculate about all sorts of violent and or criminal acts of loyalty That could be the part of the initiation The most extreme being blood in, blood out That thing of you have to kill someone

To join the chapter I'm guessing based on reading a lot of details That didn't make it into this suck That rituals vary considerably from chapter to chapter Once you're in The life of a true outlaw biker really begins You're expected to follow a few outlaw rules for the rest of your fucking life.

The big one, and this is crazy when you really kind of think about it, stand with your brother whether you agree with him or not, no matter what the consequences. All right, this guy wants to fucking kill some random people.

Well, you're going to kill some random people. The Hells Angels supposedly do have a set of written rules, but it's not like I found some official Hells Angels handbook for these, by the way. No online free downloadable PDF. Not sure they have that. Not quite their style. The rules I'll be sharing are basically what certain members have said are the rules publicly. Members are obligated to attend regular meetings, not fight with club members, other club members, not mess with another club members You know, other club members Not mess with another member's old lady Support fellow members under all circumstances

That's that big one I just stated Sonny Barger in one of his books He's written several Says the Hells Angel should never break and run He writes, it's like a golden rule When a Hells Angel fights a citizen or a rival club member Everybody rat packs to his side And if you ever don't do this, you're fucking out.

Okay? There's a strict no snitch policy. Snitch on the club. Rumor is that's a good way to end up dead. Another law enforcement rule is that when one member is pulled over by the police, all members must pull over in solidarity. That incentivizes less police interaction during the rides. As one could imagine.

Who would want to be talking about giving a speeding ticket to one biker while, you know, 20 others are a few feet away fucking watching you? Members can, in certain cases, transfer from one chapter to another. However, because of rats and infiltrators, you have to be in the chapter you're transferring from

for at least a year. Members from the other big four outlaw motorcycle clubs, you know, members from the other three, excuse me, of the big four outlaw motorcycle clubs, out know, members of the other three, excuse me, of the big four outlaw motorcycle clubs, outlaws, banditos, and pagans, not welcome to ever join the Hells Angels. I'm sure there are other clubs on that list for each charter or chapter.

The initiation process, long and thorough because it's meant to attract the most loyal members possible who are in it for the long haul, for life, people unlikely to snitch as well, right? Like that's a long undercover cop gig to undergo, you know, spend five or so years hanging around to finally get invited to become a fully patched member and get to go to the real meetings. Although that has been done, which is insane to me. Agents have spent years gaining a club's trust and then becoming

a full member, even an officer of a chapter in some cases. All this commitment, all this time trying to spend to get into the club, and then so many obligations once you're in, that tells me these clubs are primarily criminal organizations. Hard to hold a straight job with all the club shit you have to do. So there has to be a way to make money

for members in the club. And it's not like they're selling fucking cookies and baked goods. No, they're running guns, drugs, women, et cetera. Also this long initiation, all these commitments, what a great way to build strong cult-like devotion, right? A spiritual-like commitment. Kind of like when people sell all their stuff and cut off their social ties to be part of a cult. And then there's a huge psychological motivation to really want to stay in the cult, to want all that sacrifice to have

been worth it. Once you've finally been patched in to become a hell's angel, right? You got a lot of psychological incentive to just, you know, do whatever they ask you to do. You've waited so long, you sacrificed so much to finally get in. Of course, now you're going to do what the club leaders ask of you. And they know that. That's part of why the initiation process is so long, breeds, you know, stronger loyalty, which is very important if you're running drugs or guns or prostitution rings or whatever, and you don't want to go to prison for it. Once you're in, you are fucking in. The Hells Angels do not officially recognize any retirement from the club. A chapter becomes a member's new family for life, and his brothers will gather to honor his memory when he dies. Sonny Barger points out in his book,

Hells Angel, the life and times of Sonny Barger and the Hells Angels Motorcycle Club, how the cops used to mock bikers for their mile-long processions for funerals of deceased members in the early history of the club, but now that's a common practice almost everywhere. However, the club acknowledges that some members have been forced to disassociate themselves due to problems with the laws. So you can retire, but you can disassociate sometimes. Other members have been expelled for breaking one of the club's codes, or at least, you know, when they've been strongly suspected of breaking club codes. I think of that Colorado guy, you know, getting his fucking beat down earlier. Sometimes guys, you know, will get their Hells Angels themed tattoos removed.

They'll get inked over like that guy had, sometimes apparently burned off. Sounds rough. A couple more notes about expectations for members before moving on to what some of their infamous patches mean. Clubhouse is a big part of the HA lifestyle. That's home base. to what some of their infamous patches mean. Clubhouse is a big part of the HA lifestyle. That's home base. An essential part of being a member is to attend weekly meetings

that take place at clubhouses, meetings called church. Serious prospects expected to often attend weekly meetings. The Hell's Angel, you know, shown up to church, club events, not only shows commitment, it's a sign of respect for the club. They take that shit very seriously. If a member misses a meeting without good reason, he has to pay a fine of 50 to a hundred bucks, note Sonny Barger. And if you are

a prospect and you start missing meetings, well, you can just forget ever becoming a full-time member. It's so funny to me how an organization of outlaws, dudes who hate rules, end up in an organization that's pretty militant with a lot of the rules. I would fucking hate to have to show up to weekly meetings for the rest of my life. I mean, I do kick out podcasts every week, but I also like knowing that if I ever want to, I can shut all this down. You know, it's the have to I don't like. Hard drug use, once officially banned by the AHA, stating that they couldn't trust people in the club that used heroin or needles. You know, they didn't ban selling it, just don't use it. Don't get high off your own supply kind of thing. As we learned last week, or as you already knew,

narcotics are a motherfucker, really rock your world and affect your decision-making abilities. For a time, the club also banned ripoffs and drug deals known as drug burns because stealing damages the reputation of the club. Something that may surprise non-members is the fact that they have zero tolerance for sexual assault. At least that's what the Toronto Star once reported, right? And the members are expected to positively represent the group and everything they do. So they won't tolerate any funny business, but I'm going to call bullshit on that. You'll see why later in this sec. The Hells Angels also have some interesting rules about their merchandise. You don't fucking buy it or wear it unless you're a member. Right. Seriously. The merch sales really get hurt by this policy.

They've gone after a number of people and businesses trying to hijack their community in the most vicious of ways through litigation. Even their website has rules. The group's website clearly states that you need written permission from the organization to link to their website, member or not. You may not establish and or operate links

to this website with the prior written consent of the Hells Angels Motorcycle Club. Such consent may be withdrawn at any time at the Hells Angels MC's own discretion. Again, a lot of rules for these outlaws. Now let's talk about these patches. Once you become a full-fledged member, you're given patches to signify membership, which usually go on a clean leather jacket or vest. Vest also called a cut. In some docs, I've heard guys talking about putting them on denim jackets in the early days. I guess you could still do that. These patches are treated with the utmost respect. Some sources claim

that various members have not let doctors cut through their clothes in times of medical emergencies, worried about these patches getting fucked up. These patches and the cuts they're sewn into mean everything to these guys. They went through a lot of bullshit to get them. Big sign of respect to the OMG community. A akin to becoming a made man in the mafia. You can learn a lot about a man by the

patches on his cuts. Most important patch is the one you get when you become a full-fledged member, composed of three pieces, the infamous three-piece patch. This is the one referred to when someone is being patched in. Sometimes a one percenter motorcycle club also will be referred to as a three-patches MC. The top rocker patch shows the name of motorcycle club also will be referred to as a three patches MC. The top rocker patch shows the name of the club, such as Hell's Angels. And no apostrophe in Hell's Angels, by the way. On the club's official site, the missing apostrophe is explained away as being intentional. The site claims that since there are many types of hell, no apostrophe is needed. However, even if hells is used in a plural sense, common rules regarding

punctuation dictated should, you know, at least end with an apostrophe. I'm guessing one of the early guys fucked up and they just went with it. And now,

anyone teasing them about it, you know, is giving them a good reason to, you know, beat them up. I've noticed, you know, a lot of, on their website,

punctuation, not important. Good grammar, good spelling, not important to the angels. The center patch is the MC symbol with the HA, that's the death head. The bottom rocker shows the place of important to the angels. The center patch is the MC symbol with the HA.

That's the death head. The bottom rocker shows the place of origin of the club, the name of the chapter, or simply the area to which the club belongs. So the back of someone's, you know, cut might show hell's angels up top. Then the death head patch below centered on the, on the back.

Then at the bottom, Ontario or British Columbia or California. Every club cut also has another smaller patch to the right of the death head with the initials MC, you know, for motorcycle club. This is to make sure you don't confuse them with some fucking wussy grip, or Jesus Christ. I was trying to say crybaby and drips. Crybaby drip, you know, club.

You also sometimes see the number 81 on the patch, which simply refers to the number eight for the letter H and the number one for the letter A in Hells Angels. A lot of patches in the world of bikers. They all mean something. If you want to know who the outlaws are compared to who casual riders are, the 1% are diamond shaped patch, we'll let you know. Some patches also say nomad. Nomad is an unusual status granted to certain veteran members who for various reasons cannot remain or need to be free from the specific location where their chapter is. Maybe the law is really after them and their presence bringing a lot of unwanted heat on the chapter because they're longtime members and are

not leaving the HAMC itself. They may be granted a nomad bottom rocker patch until they settle down in another location, at which point they're no longer nomads, but brothers of a new chapter. Another important patch, 13. Common patch worn by 1% of bikers. It can have several meanings. The most common held meaning, it's the 13th letter of the alphabet, M standing for either smoking or dealing marijuana or dealing meth. Also known to stand for the original or mother chapter of an MC. The filthy few, maybe the scariest one. Another patch might make you want to think twice about sitting down at the same diner when you see a person wearing it or at the same, same bar can be represented by the 666 patch worn by the Hells Angels.

666 equals FFF, which equals Filthy Few Forever. Got to tread real lightly around anyone wearing this patch. Filthy Few is for the Hells Angels enforcers, a.k.a. members that have killed for the club, particularly members known for killing. As in, you know, you have someone you need dead, maybe you call in a favor to another MC. Your MC is friendly, you know, with,

that your MC is friendly with, and you have this special guy kill someone you want dead in exchange for giving them something. There are actually a few patches that can mean killing a motherfucker. The Ace of Spades is another one. This patch is known as a death card,

symbolizes that this MC's member is either willing to kill for the club or has already done it, probably already done it. A patch with a skull with crossbones or sabers means respect few, fear none. Also can symbolize that member has killed for the group. Then there's the 19-219, stands for the letters SBS, which stand for steam, baby steam Then there's 4196, DSF, Dream Steam Forever. Those are patches only worn by members of the Cleveland Steamers MC. Maybe that's horseshit, but the rest were real.

Tattoos have always been big in the biker world. The A.J. have their own tattoos as well that you better not fucking put on your body unless you want to risk having them kidnap you, tie you up, black that tattoo out, you know, maybe burn it off, beat your ass, or worse. When a member leaves for a reason that isn't somehow okayed by the club, very rare exception, the A.J. tattoos, they got to go. Usually inked over, but sometimes, you know, there are rumors of them being, again, burnt off, or, this sounds even worse, cut off.

Like, flayed off. Yee! Then there are nicknames. When I watched a doc made by the H.A., Hell's Angels Forever, released in 1983, seems like a lot of these dudes have nicknames, almost all of them. Nicknames like Tramp, Tiny, Magoo,

Buzzard, Zorro, Gut, even Barf. God, that would suck to make it all the way from a hangaround to being a prospect, to being a patched-in member, to being president, and you're still known as barf. Okay. Now that we have a real good feel

for who this group generally is, let's move from the 101 level HA class, excuse me, to the 202 with today's Time Suck timeline. Right after a word from our sponsors. Thank you for listening to the sponsors that I'm so proud to have. And now it's timeline time for real. Hi-ya-ya!

Strap on those boots, soldier. We're marching down a time-suck timeline. September 2nd, 1945. World War II ends in the Pacific four months after it ended in Europe. The Empire of Japan is surrendered and most American troops are heading home. Starting the following month, lasting until September of 1946, 8 million American men and women from every service branch, mostly men, scattered across 55 theaters of war spanning four continents, brought home under Operation Magic Carpet. Lasting 360 days, Operation Magic Carpet, the largest combined air and sea lift ever organized. On average, Operation Magic Carpet. Lasting 360 days, Operation Magic Carpet,

the largest combined air and sea lift ever organized. On average, Operation Magic Carpet transported 22,222 Americans home every day for nearly one year straight. Cue the post-war baby boom. And a lot of dudes trying to figure out what to do with the rest of their lives now that the Nazis and the Japanese were defeated. Cue motorcycles getting real popular.

Cheap mode of transportation for a lot of young single dudes. There's a surplus of them, you know, right? We talked about from the end of the war. A lot of women find them fucking sexy. What young single straight dude doesn't want to ride shit women find sexy? Hey, Lusafina, pull up that skirt a bit. Hop on the back of this bike. Feel all that horsepower vibrate between your thighs and the wind in your hair. Right after World War II, there were fewer than 200,000 motorcycles on American streets. A decade later, there will be over a million. Motorcycle clubs boomed, especially after they picked up new national bad boy status. After the weekend of July 3rd through 6th, Thursday through Sunday, 1947,

a catalyst-type event happened, the Hollister Riot. That weekend, there was an American Motorcycle Association sanctioned gypsy tour motorcycle rally event. A lot of words for the sign, a lot of words for the banner, held in Hollister, California. And what happened that weekend gave birth to the term one percenter. It is believed by many in the biker community that the events of those days were much overstated

in many media publications, making the myth several levels grander than the facts. Still, the media hype surrounding this event gave a massive adrenaline shot to the rise of outlaw motorcycle club culture. Without this event, we might not have the Cleveland Steamers. I mean,

Hells Angels. Hollister had hosted similar types of motorcycle rallies previously, had a strong connection with the biker community, include the 1936 Gypsy Tour, which was held in the town and did not raise major concerns. This was the first rally in Hollister in several years due to World War II, so first in a while,

and way bigger than previous ones. Estimated that approximately 4,000 motorcycle enthusiasts and fans attended. And here's what happened according to some of their accounts. Alcohol was consumed in vast quantities, resulting in drunken disorderly behavior. Some fights occurred.

Motorcycles were raced in the streets. There was minor vandalism. Opinion seemed to vary as to how much disorderly conduct there was, how much fighting, drinking, et cetera. Did the event truly devolve into a riot as the event was labeled by the media? Probably not.

Was it just another everyday large scale event where 4,000 people gathered and consumed alcohol in close proximity for three media? Probably not. Was it just another everyday large-scale event where 4,000 people gathered and consumed alcohol in close proximity for three days? Probably. Maybe a bit scarier to locals because a lot of those 4,000,

you know, people were big guys with tattoos and loud bikes. The Hollister police force said to have only consisted of seven officers. So an insufficient number for managing an event

containing 4,000 drunk people. Maybe they really were overwhelmed, but it still wasn't a riot. Estimated that 50 people were arrested, mostly for minor alcohol-related offenses. There were approximately 60 injuries. Only three were serious. One was a broken leg.

Another was a skull fracture. Other than having to witness the chaos of the weekend, no Hollister locals suffered any physical harm. The clubs that would set off the outlaw biker revolution that were in Hollister that day, Raising Little Hell, were the Pissed Off Bast bastards of Bloomington MC, the market street commandos MC, the galloping goose MC. It's not the best name.

And the aptly named booze fighters MC. No Cleveland steamers. Unfortunately, all four of those MC still around in some capacity, by the way, I checked a few weeks after the Hollister riot on July 21st, 1947. Well, I checked, you know what? I'm not, now I'm having a second, I'm second guessing myself on the Galloping Goose. I know that the Booze Fighters, Mark Street Commandos, the Blooming,

I think they're all, I think they're all still out there in some form, even if it's real small. A few weeks after the Hollister riot on July 21st, 1947, a picture from that weekend ran in Life Magazine. Got everybody all worked up. It's a picture of a dude that would strike fear into the hearts of America.

A bleary-eyed, beer-bellied hoodlum surrounded by empty beer bottles at his feet and a bottle in each beefy fist. And he sat on a throne of debauchery, a Harley. He gabbed. On that day, you know, readers learned about a cyclist's holiday, as life called it. A short caption told of a three-day nightmare

when an estimated 4,000 two-wheeled terrors rolled into the sleepy California town of Hollister, You know, readers learned about a cyclist's holiday, as life called it, a short caption told of a three-day nightmare, when an estimated 4,000 two-wheeled terrors rolled into the sleepy California town of Hollister, best known for its production of garlic, to attend a motorcycle rally over Independence Day weekend. Here's how life described the riot. Racing their vehicles down the main street and through traffic lights, they rammed into restaurants and bars, breaking furniture and mirrors. Some rested a while by the curb. Others hardly paused. Police arrested many for drunkenness and indecent exposure, but could not restore order. Finally, after two days, the cyclist left with a brazen explanation. We like to show off. It's just

a lot of fun. Cue small-town panic across America. Oh, God, Hank! What if they come to our town next? What about the children, Hank? What would they come to our town next? What about the children, Hank? What would they do to the children? The events that weekend captured the imagination of fiction author Frank Rooney. A few years later, in January of 1951, Harper's Magazine published The Cyclist Raid, Rooney's short story of a motorcycle gang occupying and wrecking a small California town. And then that story caught the eye of talented filmmaker Stanley Kramer. And two years later, Stanley would produce the Hollywood version of the Hollister Rites, starring bad boy heartthrob Marlon Brando. Brando in his fucking prime, two years after a streetcar named Desire.

Stella! The motorcycle movie was The Wild One. More on that film in a few minutes. The one percenters claimed that the image in Life magazine that started the legend of the unruly biker gang was actually not a candid photo from Hollister, but rather a stage propaganda photo set up by a San Francisco Chronicle photographer named Barney Peterson. Fucking Barney Peterson. Classic Barney Peterson. One witness said this about the photo. We went uptown, my former wife and I, to see all the excitement. And we ran into these people. They were on the sidewalk and there was a photographer. They started to scrape up the

bottles with their feet, you know, from one side to another. And then they took the motorcycle, picked it up, set it right in the glass. That's not his motorcycle, I can tell you that. He was just in the vicinity and he was pretty well loaded. There was a bar right there, Johnny's bar. I think he came wandering out of that bar and they just got him to sit down there. I told my wife, that's not right. They shouldn't be doing that. Let's stand behind them so they won't take the picture. I figured if I was behind him, they wouldn't take it, but he took a picture anyhow. This fellow did. He didn't care. And then after that, everybody went about their business. A journalist banning the truth to make their story more sensational. So they'll sell more

papers, more copies, advance their career further. What? That never happens. Weirdly comforting to be reminded that journalistic sensationalism, nothing new. And I've, you know, talked about it before. I did a whole TEDx talk on it, but still nice to be reminded. Definitely are a lot of good journalists out there reporting the story as they actually, you know, happen, but also a lot of spin. Got a lot worse past few years, you know, than it was for many years previously, in my opinion, but Spin, certainly nothing new. March 17th,

1948. Less than a year after the events at Hollister, the first Hells Angels Motorcycle Club is founded in California's San Bernardino area, 60 miles west of downtown LA. The Mysterio Bishop family, sometimes credited as being the original founders of the HAMC. If true,

there is next to nothing on who they were or what they did. From what we could find, they were British American war immigrants who founded the club in Fontana, 10 miles west of San Bernardino. And then shortly after forming, they merged with members

of the pissed off bastards of Bloomington and a few members of some other early clubs to form the Hells Angels. Maybe. No one was taking real good notes those first few years. According to the Hells Angels. Maybe. No one was taking real good notes those first few years. According to the Hells Angels website, the club's name was first suggested

by an associate of the founders named Arvid Olsen. Went over that earlier, right? And who did Arvid Olsen share that name with? Possibly Otto Fridelli. Otto commonly credited as the founder or at least the first real chapter president. Otto was an early president of the Hells Angels Motorcycle Club San Bernardino chapter,

possibly the first in 1948. Previously a member of the Pissed Off Bastards of Bloomington who attended that 1947 Hollister riot. Otto was born June 28th, 1931 in Madison, Dane County, Wisconsin. Grew up in LA, moved to Santa Barbara when he was in his teens. Spent some time in the army working as a mechanic,

later discharged when it was found out he had a criminal record. Interestingly, Otto himself before he passed away in 2008 stated he was not the founder of the HA. He is listed in many sources to have joined the club in 1948, but the date may have been a year or two later. Some sources starting as late as 1951.

You know, if the source that listed him as being the founder of the club in 1948 also lists him as a World War II veteran, which is unrealistic because he would have been 14 at the end of the war. The truth is,

nobody fucking knows who founded the AHA, not even the Hells Angels. Not with 100% certainty. Keeps it mysterious. Right? Adds to their mythological appeal. Some mysterious early outlaw

riding in the shadows. Who knows who he actually was? Some mysterious drifter founded the club, then just hopped on his bike, rode off into the desert and vanished. Maybe the devil himself founded the angels. Once the evil MC seeds were planted, he rode his hog down into hell. In the 1950s, probable hell's angel founder, Otto, charged in connection to a robbery of the Miramar Hotel. In the late 60s, he was convicted of possession of a firearm during a raid on a Rancho Cucamonga ranch, used as a clubhouse

slash hideout of sorts by the HA. As Otto already had a prior conviction from the robbery, he was sentenced to three years in prison. And then during his time in prison, started reading the Bible for several hours a day, found religion, and that significantly, you know, changed his life from that point on. And that experience probably led him to downplay his early involvement in the group and possible founding of the group. After leaving prison, he decided that the HA no longer represented the sort of life he wanted to live. So he joined the Santa Barbara chapter of the Black Sheep Motorcycle Ministry, Harley riders aiming to spread the word of Christ. Found a job as a mechanic at a Harley dealership in Whittier, California. Held that for several years, then got involved in swimming pool construction,

a career he kept until his retirement around 2003, and then died in 2008 at the age of 76. Back to our timeline. 1954, the film The Wild One starring Marlon Brando gives outlaw bikers mythical stature and inspires a movement of folks to the clubhouses and the open road. The film premiered on December 30th, 1953, then got a lot of buzz amongst the kids of America

the following several months. By the spring of 1944, all the coolest kids who didn't want to be drips wanted to ride a motorcycle and raise a little hell. The plot and setting of the movie, inspired by the Hollister riots, showed these men as enemies of the status quo, sticking to the man.

In the film, Brando's lead character, Johnny Strabler, is asked, what are you rebelling against? And the answer is, what have you got? He's fucking rebelling against everything, you drip squares, everything. The film was banned in the UK for 14 years. Brando's Johnny became very influential on 1950s youth culture. The long sideburns, the perfecto style motorcycle jacket, the tilted cap. The long sideburns, the perfecto-style motorcycle jacket, the tilted cap. The movie's only fuck-up was that he rode a 1950 Triumph Thunderbird 16, not a Harley. A British bike in an American-a-la movie!

Brando's hairstyle helped to inspire a craze for sideburns, which led to the looks of iconic heartthrobs James Dean, Elvis Presley. Presley even modeled the Johnny Stravler image in his role in the 1957 film Jailhouse Rock. Here's a little expert of a scene where Johnny's getting in a downtown fist fight with Chino, leader of the rival biker gang,

and one-time friend of Johnny when their two gangs wrote as one. This is the kind of shit that gets you banned for over a decade from England back in the 50s. Stop this. I've seen hoodlums, you heard it. Oh man, they're rolling around on the ground. A lady's watching, she looks upset. Oh, they're punching.

Mm-hmm. Gotta get these hoodlums out of our town before they burn to the ground. Oh, man. Now they're smashing up a

store. Or about to. Oh, get that fight away from the windows, guys. You're gonna knock him... Oh, no!

You knocked him right into the window and broke glass by the tuxedo. Everyone's very concerned. So many guys in leather jackets think it's funny. It's not funny. Okay. Oh, this guy's pouring beer on him. What's he going to do?

Uh-huh. Okay. Oh, this guy's pouring beer on him. What you gonna do? Johnny. Uh-huh. I love you. And that's how it ends, that little scene. Johnny, I love you. He says, I love you at the end of the scene. Why was this movie banned? It actually, you know, feels like a weirdly wholesome kind of outlaw movie.

I mean, definitely by today's standards. But it glorified rebels, and the queen didn't care for that one bit. Maybe got her a little wet though. Maybe, I don't know. I don't have factual knowledge of the queen's vaginal historical humidity. Uh, this movie made bikers outlaw MC bikers seem totally hip and cool. And Brando's Johnny undoubtedly increased membership art influencing life throughout the fifties. Hell's angels groups spread out across, eventually uniting into a loose confederation with each club maintaining its own autonomy. And clubs have held regional loose confederations ever since. No one knows for sure how close clubs from around the world are, but they're not thought to be super close. I mean, I imagine if you're a member of a chapter in LA, you can probably get into a clubhouse in Amsterdam.

You can probably talk to some people, make some connections, maybe help run something or other. Different clubs have for sure worked together in various criminal enterprises over the years, but it's not like they all work together all the time. In April of 1957 in Oakland, a new player to the Hells Angels leadership crowd would found the Oakland chapter, at least in part,

and that's Sonny Barger, we've talked about. The guy who consulted on Sons of Anarchy, the Outlaw MC series that ran on FX from 2008 to 2014. The focus of that show, the Sam Crow MC, based in Central California, largely based on early Bay Area Hells Angels. Sonny Barger actually played an aging and incarcerated outlaw in that series, Lenny the Pimp Janowitz. He would go on to become the most well-known HA figure, be seen as a leader of the club nationwide, even worldwide. He's often said, you know, he was not that influential on their growth or that important of a leader. That's a common theme in Hell's Angels history,

operating in secrecy and downplaying, not taking a lot of credit for stuff. Let's take a brief tour through Barger's life because he's an important, maybe the most important angel. Born on October 8th, 1938, is Ralph Hubert Barger. Grew up in California in the 1940s, early 50s. His mother left him with an alcoholic father and an older sister when he was just four months old. He was suspended from school several times for assaulting teachers. He liked to fight the other kids. Starting to sound like the childhood of one of these serial killers we've explored here now. However, Barger himself has written that he was not a bully or a juvenile delinquent. He stresses that while he lost interest in school

and had some asshole teachers, okay, he didn't leave school to rob and hurt. Wasn't that much of a fighter. Spent a lot of time as a teen reading, working at a grocery store, he says. In 1955, he enlisted in the Army at the age of 16, but was then discharged 14 months later when they discovered he'd forged his birth certificate

to join. After his return from the Army, Barger drifted between menial jobs, looking for purpose in life. That drifting led him to finding a motorcycle club. In 1956, he joined his first bike club, the Oakland Panthers. It wasn't quite what he was looking for. He later wrote,

I quit the club as quickly as I started it. Sure, they'd party, but when the shit came down, they didn't stick together. I felt no brotherhood. Barger then rode around with some other Bay Area fellows talking about starting up a new club. One of the bikers, Don Reeves, aka Boots Reeves, no idea how he got that nickname, but I'm guessing this is probably a more colorful story than he just really liked boots. He wore a patch he'd found in Sacramento, small skull wearing an aviator cap with a set of wings. Boots suggested they name their new club after the patch,'d found in Sacramento. Small skull, wearing an aviator cap with a set of wings. Boots suggested they name their new club after the patch, the Hells Angels.

They apparently had no idea there was already a motorcycle club, and a few of them now, down in Southern California called the Hells Angels. They went to a local trophy shop, had a set of patches made, April of 1957. Then they heard there were other Hells Angels clubs. So the new Oakland chapter formed by Barger and his friends never actually voted in by other chapters. They rode down to Southern California to visit with the other chapters. And then, you know,

they all decided to form their own national club. Because of how all this happened, Sonny Barger is sometimes listed as a founder of the Hells Angels. He didn't open the first chapter, but seems to have opened what was thought to be, what he thought was the first chapter. And then he was the guy that organized

the first couple of chapters into a proper national club. Early on, Barger recalls, we decided that if we were all going to wear the same patch, we were going to function under the same rules. To shore up our territory fast, we made up tactical rules early on. Example, there couldn't be one charter within 50 miles of another except for Oakland and Frisco. There were some fights between these early chapters, namely over the correct Hells Angels patch. And there were conflicts with some other early California motorcycle clubs like the Gypsy Jokers for territorial dominance. And those other early clubs were driven out of California for the most part by the Angels. The Angels, controlling outlaw MC culture in the 1960s, would connect them to the counterculture,

which would then increase their cool factor, expand membership, really cement their status around the world as the big time biker gang. The Oakland chapter was Sonny Barger serving as club president ended up assuming an informal position of authority within the Hells Angels organization. Going back, according to Barger to a standoff they had with local police and the

California highway patrol in the aftermath of an outlaw motorcycle meeting in Porterville, California in 1963. To be clear though, there is no official head chapter. Their organizational hierarchy that way is kind of confusing actually. Like they have an international website, but who runs it? Don't know. As an organization, they will sue for stuff like trademark and copyright infringement, but who is suing? The Hells Angel Motorcycle Corporation, a nonprofit established in California in 1970 that owns and protects the club's intellectual property. So they probably run the website. But who runs that corporation? Well, it has board members, sources stated it's controlled by hundreds of chapters that make up the Hells Angels Club, but in what way? When a new chapter is chartered, do they then get a cut of Hells Angels merchandising

money, for example? All that info kept pretty secret, just like the HA likes it. Around the mid-1960s, chapters began to be formed outside of the state of California, also outside the U.S. When we award charters in new states, Barger explains, it's always done by national vote. When a prospective club lets us know they want to become Hells Angels, we'll check them out to see if they're stand-up people. But who exactly is we? Again, never totally made clear. He continues, status. The same process that lets in individuals applies to entire new chapters as well. Once we

sanctioned each official Hells Angels charter, it became their responsibility to keep anybody from starting up an illegal charter in their part of the country. When you ask Google who runs the Hells Angels, Sonny Barger does pop up, but technically never been more than a chapter president. Again, so much secrecy, not even the Justice Department, you know, seems to know if any sort of international counsel is in charge or if like one guy like Sonny is, or at least if they do know that they're not, you know, putting that out anywhere. They do have a way of making sure chapters are official. We just, we non-angels just don't know exactly for sure what that is. Reminds me of the Freemasons in some ways.

1961, the mysterious angels keep growing. The first official international chapter formeded in New Zealand, 1961 Yeah, they've been rowdy over there From time to time ever since There was a slight clash between police And about 60 New Zealand Hells Angels At a rally as recently as February of this year 1964, 50 San Francisco police

Raid a Hells Angels clubhouse On Folsom Street Arrest 30 angels and 18 of their Quote-unquote chicks on a variety of charges. If they weren't before 1964, they are now either a criminal organization or, as they like to say, an organization with a lot of criminals in it. That's how members try and explain what the AHA is. They like to say stuff like, we're not a criminal organization. Well, we just happen to have a lot of criminals in our organization. March of 1965, the Lynch Report is released. This is big as far as the history of the group.

This report really frames the HA as organized crime in the national public consciousness. Thomas C. Lynch, California's Attorney General, releases a report detailing a six-month study of outlaw motorcycle gangs in the state, with most of the report's focus on the Angels. The investigation was prompted by reports of a gang rape at Monterey Beach on Labor Day the previous year. Two girls, aged 14 and 15, allegedly taken from their dates by a gang of filthy, frenzied, boozed-up motorcycle hoodlums called Hell's Angels and dragged off to be repeatedly assaulted. A deputy sheriff summoned by one of the dates said he arrived at the beach and saw a huge bonfire surrounded by cyclists of both sexes.

Then the two sobbing, near hysterical girls staggered out of the darkness, begging for help. One completely nude, the other had on only a torn sweater. 300 Hells Angels had gathered in the seaside Monterey area for the purpose of raising funds amongst themselves to send the body of a former member killed in a riding accident back to his mom in North Carolina.

Four Angels would be charged with rape. Law enforcement agencies in California revamped their approach to policing the motorcycle gangs based largely on this incident and, you know, other incidents in the Lynch report. The report captures the news media's attention, pushing the club further into the national spotlight in the worst of ways. Those rape charges would later be dismissed. The deputy district attorney involved in the case said a doctor examined the girls and found no evidence to support the rape charges. One girl refused to testify. The other, given a lie detector test, found to be wholly unreliable. Lie detectors, though, we know now are pretty worthless. Victims of actual rape do refuse to testify all the time. I think there's still a good chance something happened to them and the angels were responsible think there's still a good chance something happened to

them and the angels were responsible. However, this part of the story never got much press at all. The public heard that a bunch of Hells Angels raped some teen girls, never heard those charges would later be dropped. A lot of HA members say that's how it goes, that the only press they get is bad press, and a lot of it isn't true. On July 3rd, 1965, something called the 4th of July Emergency Plan based on the Lynch Report is enacted enacted in the L.A. area and Bay Area. A California police plan regarding security tactics for Angels parties being held on Independence Day. The police now count 463 Hells Angels, 205 around L.A., 233 in the San Francisco, Oakland area. Bay Area journalist Hunter S. Thompson, though, heavily disputes this assessment,

writing for The Nation in 1965, I don't know about LA, but the real figures for the Bay Area are 30 or so in Oakland and exactly 11 with one facing expulsion in San Francisco. This disparity makes it hard to accept other police statistics. That kind of disparity is something else often pointed out by Hells Angels members, you know, that a lot of the criminal lore that surrounds them is hype and propaganda. Let's talk a little more about Hunter S. Thompson and his interaction with the group now. I love Hunter S. Thompson. 1967, Hunter S. Thompson's book, Hells Angels, the strange and terrible saga of the outlaw motorcycle gangs,

published and gets a lot of buzz. This nonfiction work chronicled Thompson's time spent with the HA over a few years, including around a year, you know, almost solely focused on them. The book underscores the gang's lawlessness and criticizes the police and the news media for blowing tales of terror out of proportion. Also helps solidify the Hells Angels position as an important part of the counterculture of the 60s. Hunter S. Thompson, the meat sack who deserves his own suck for sure. For now, let's learn a bit about this enigmatic gonzo journalist. Gonzo journalism, a style of journalism written without any claims of objectivity,

often including the reporter as part of the story using a first-person narrative. And this will circle back into the Angels. It involves a reporter reporting the action from inside it. He or she often becomes part of the story. Thompson didn't invent this style of journalism, but he did coin the phrase gonzo journalism. And he definitely is a Thompson didn't invent this style of journalism, but he did coin the phrase gonzo journalism, and he definitely is the guy who popularized this style and became the most associated with it. Also room to romanticize, fictionalize some events in gonzo journalism.

Probably the best example of gonzo journalism is Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas. The book published in 1971 that inspired the Johnny Depp movie released in 1998, that inspired me to try and recreate parts of that experience in 2010, that I talked about then on an episode of This Is Not Happening on Comedy Central that's now on YouTube. Don't do all of the acid. Thompson was in Vegas on assignment from Sports Illustrated and was supposed to write a 250-word photograph caption on the Mint 400 motorcycle race. And that story kind of got away from him, and he ended up writing something Sports Illustrated, quote, aggressively rejected. That became something so much more meaningful than some forgettable caption. Thompson, one of a kind. He was born in Louisville, Kentucky, July 18th, 1937. Showed an act for writing at a young age. His father, Jack, was a World War I veteran and

insurance agent who died when he was in high school. His mom, Virginia, an alcoholic, left penniless and in charge, Jesus Christ, was an alcoholic, left penniless and in charge of, you know, three boys, Hunter being the oldest. Frequently involved in mischief, Thompson ran with a group of wild friends that were constantly testing the limits, as he said. Eventually, his friends grew out of that. He, God bless him, did not. While in high school, Thompson's writing was so strong and unique, the poor kid from Kentucky was accepted into the venerable Athenium Literary Association, an organization whose membership was mostly comprised of the kids of well-to-do families. Thompson's unconventional contributions to the group's newsletter, typically sarcastic, pissed a lot of people off. While honing his unique literary craft, Thompson simultaneously built up his reputation as a hooligan and a

prankster, escalating his extracurricular activities from harmless endeavors, such as dumping a truckload of pumpkins in front of a hotel, that's hilarious, to shoplifting, vandalism, and eventually robbery. During this time, he also developed what would become a lifelong fascination with firearms and a taste for drugs and alcohol. By his senior year, Thompson found himself on the wrong side of the law, arrested several times for petty crimes. His growing criminal record led to his ejection from that literary group, also earned him a few weeks in jail. Hoping to cure him of his wicked ways, his judge in a robbery case offered him the choice between prison or the military. Thompson chose Uncle Sam, and in 1956,

he joined the U.S. Air Force. After completing basic training, Thompson was stationed at Eglin Air Force Base in Florida, where he found an escape from a rigid follow orders environment by working as a sports editor for the Command Courier. Thompson didn't last long in the military. His poor attitude, troublemaking nature, led to an early discharge in 1958. And then for the next few years, he bounced around the country working for a string of small town newspapers, getting fired repeatedly,

also spending a short time as a copy boy from Time Magazine. He spent a brief period in Puerto Rico where he worked for a sports magazine. In his spare time, he worked on personal writing projects like the still unpublished Prince Jellyfish, described in The Guardian as an autobiographical novel about a boy from Louisville going to the big city and struggling against the dunces to make his way.

Also wrote the autobiographical novel The Rum Diary. Rejected and unpublished during his lifetime, Johnny Depp founded Amongst Hunters Things after he died. It was published in 2008, then adapted into a Depp film in 2011. Though Thompson's Wild Ways frequently cost him his job, also endeared him to the counterculture that was gaining strength around the country at that time and helped establish him as a fearless journalist with a unique voice. In 1965, these bohemian credentials earned him an assignment to write an article for the nation about the Hells Angels Motorcycle Club. Published in May, the story was a huge sensation, led to a book deal for Thompson.

He had embedded himself within the notorious gang for a year. Though members nearly killed him at the end of his time with them, at least from his telling of it, Thompson came out the other side with the book, Hells Angels, The Strange and Terrible Saga of the Outlaw Motorcycle Gangs, published in 1967. The immersive and hallucinatory first-person account

of his experiences was an instant smash, firmly establishing Hunter S. Thompson as a journalistic force, launching what would be his trademark style. And it gave a ton of free publicity to the HA and undoubtedly helped launch new chapters around the country, despite some club members later saying they felt betrayed by how Hunter portrayed them. Hunter wrote about how club members both scoffed at and lived up to their reputations as lawbreakers. And here's a few excerpts from Thompson's book with a little, I don't know, music that feels appropriate.

California, Labor Day weekend. Early with ocean fog still in the streets, outlaw motorcyclists wearing chains, shades and greasy Levi's, rolled out from damp garages, all-night diners, and cast-off one-night pads in Frisco, Hollywood,

Purdue, and East Oakland. Heading for the Monterey Peninsula north of Big Sur, the menace is loose again, the Hells Angels, the 100-carat headline, running fast and loud on the early morning freeway. Low in the saddle, nobody smiles.

Jamming crazy through traffic at 90 miles an hour down the center stripe, missing by inches. Like Genghis Khan on an iron horse, a monster steed with a fiery anus, flat out through the eye of a beer can and up your daughter's leg with no quarter-assed and none given. Show the squares some class. Give them a whiff of those kicks they'll never know. Ah, these righteous dudes, they love to screw it on. Little Jesus, The Gimp, Chocolate George, Buzzard, Zorro, Hambone, Clean Cut, Tiny, Terry the Tramp, Frenchie, Moldy Marvin, Mother Miles, Dirty Ed, Chuck the Duck,

Fat Freddy, Filthy Phil, Charger Charlie, The Child Molester, Crazy Cross, Puff Magoo Animal, and at least 100 more. Tense for the action, long hair in the wind, beard and bandanas flapping, earrings, armpits, chain whips, swastikas, and stripped down Harleys flashing chrome as traffic on 101 moves over. Nervous to let the formation pass like a burst of dirty thunder. They call themselves Hell's Angels. They ride rape and raid like marauding cavalry, and they boast that no police force can break up their criminal motorcycle fraternity. Brittany Jarvis, a charter member of the Hells Angels, who later became a Frisco Chronicle police reporter, says, Some of them are pure animals. They'd be animals in any society. These guys are outlaw types who should have been born 100 years ago.

They should have been gunfighters. And Hell's Angels, speaking off the record, says, we're the one percenters, man. The one percent that doesn't fit and doesn't care. So don't talk to me about your doctor bills and your traffic warrants. I mean, you get your woman and your bike and your banjo, and I mean, you're on your way.

We've punched way out of a hundred rambles. Rumbles. Stay alive with our boots and our fists on. We're royalty among motorcycle outlaws, baby. Need to see banjo? I feel like I got a jam. Bang, bang, bang. Boom, bang, dong, tang.

Ba-dang, tang. Boom, tang, ba-dang, tang. Boom, dong, dong, tang. Ba-dang, tang. That's the Hell's Angels official air banjo riff. Anyway, Hunter paints quite the colorful picture.

Dudes like Dirty Ed, the Gimp, Charger Charlie, the Child Molester, Terry the Tramp. Hoping Charlie's nickname isn't just. Oh boy.

Maybe would have wanted to grab a few drinks with those guys when I was younger. Not so sure now. Not sure I'd risk an ass beating to hear some colorful tales.

Sonny Barger overall did not care for how Thompson described his crew. He would later write about what he thought of Thompson and his depiction of the Angels. He wrote, Hunter S. Thompson wrote an article in the May 17th, 1965 issue of The Nation about the Hells Angels and called it the motorcycle gangs, losers and outsiders. I actually liked the way it was written, even though some of the facts were exaggerated. After the article received a good reaction, Thompson came back to Oakland, hung around the club's favorite biker bar hangouts until he and I finally met face to face. He told me he wanted to ride with the club and me and write a book about us. Since I liked the way he wrote the Oakland and Frisco chapters, let Hunter hang out with the club for a price, two kegs of

beer. But as time went by, Hunter turned out to be a real weenie and a stone fucking coward. You heard how he walks around his house now with his pistols, shooting them out of his windows to impress writers who show up to interview him. He's all show and no go. When he tried to act tough with us, no matter what happened, Hunter Thompson got scared. I ended up not liking him at all. A tall, skinny, typical hillbilly from Kentucky. He was a total fake.

Hunter got along with some of the members better than me. Yeah, all right. Barger would also tell the story about Thompson's claim that he was almost killed by the HA, writing, When his book was done, he asked if he could ride for a long time, since he finished up his writing. When his book was done, he asked if he could ride up with us to Squaw Rock for a gun run. When we were there, Junkie George got into an argument with his old lady and he slapped her. Hey, it happens. Then George's own dog bit him. Junkie George was so pissed off, he kicked the dog too.

Hunter walked up to George and told him, only punks slap their old ladies and kick dogs. This really pissed George off, so he poleaxed Hunter while a couple of us kicked him around. Poleaxe, by the way, is to hit someone hard enough to knock them down like you've knocked them down with an actual poleaxe, this medieval weapon. Not a term that's used that often. And I have to say, this assessment of Thompson makes Sonny Barger look like a fucking coward. What? Thompson stuck up for a woman and dog getting domestically abused, and then a couple guys beat his ass, and he's a coward? Standing up to a Hell's Angel surrounded by other Hell's Angels? That sounds pretty brave to me. On the flip side, what's tough about ganging up on a small guy, a hunter not a big man, and beating him down with your buddies? Literally nothing

tough about that. Like, real easy to beat down one dude when you're doing it surrounded by your friends, when you're all joining in. Why didn't George the fucking junkie, the wife slapper and dog kicker, dude who sounds like a piece of shit, fight Hunter one-on-one? Hilarious to me that he's calling out Thompson for being a fucking coward and then immediately proceeds to implicate himself in some cowardly shit. And I say this as a no self-proclaimed tough guy, but I've known some real tough guys and either seen them fight more than one dude by themselves or heard stories about them taking on two or more men from people I trust and win or lose, that's tough.

Barger may be overall pretty tough, but not in that example. Not looking great, this recollection of his final hang with Thompson. Barger continues and returns to critiquing Thompson in his book saying, he was bleeding, broken up and sobbing and we told him to get in his car and drive away, broken up, and sobbing, and we told him

to get in his car and drive away. He rode to a nearby police station, and they told him to clear out too. They didn't want him bleeding in their bathroom. I read the book Hell's Angels, a strange and terrible saga. When it came out in 1967, it was junk. The worst part is that it became law enforcement guide on the club. There was a lot of writer's exaggeration, along with the writer's dream and drug-induced commentary, like when he talks about members pissing on their patches, or members having to wear pants dipped in oil and piss, blood in, blood out. The cops claimed that for years after.

That kind of stupid mythology came right out of Hunter's book. Plus, Hunter never delivered on the beer kegs, the cheap son of a bitch. The rest of the Hells Angels saw the book for what it was, another burn. Right? And that's part of the thing. Nobody gets this right.

Nobody understands this. They released a documentary later, though, that really kind of lines up with all the smear kind of articles written about them that I find interesting that I'll talk about. In June of 1967, Bikers on Film, Hell's Angels on Wheels is released. It's a movie starring Jack Nicholson featuring a nonverbal cameo by Mr. Barger himself. One of many biker films that became popular in the 60s. Barger actually consulted. For a leader of a secretive organization, he sure likes to peek into the limelight from time to time.

This film will continue to grow the lore of the Wild West outlaw biker gang known as the HA, life influencing art influencing life. The Hells Angels get more counterculture cred in 1968 when Tom Wolfe's The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test, another uniquely influential nonfiction counterculture book, is published. The book chronicles Mr. Wolfe's travels with author Ken Kesey. He wrote One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest and his hippie band of merry pranksters on road trips and adventures,

including experiments with LSD. One weekend, Mr. Kesey invites the Hells Angels to an epic party, wins them over with LSD. Over a weekend of drugs, alcohol, and debauchery, the two groups form an unlikely alliance. Despite their reputation for violence, the Angels become regulars on the hippie scene associated with Mr. Kesey and Jerry Garcia of the Grateful Dead, amongst others. Other music icons, especially from the Bay Area, soon reach out to the Hells Angels. Seems like the common theme between everyone was dew and acid. The Hells Angels reportedly were dealing it soon and a variety of other drugs.

So good friends to have around if you like those drugs. July 14th, 1969, another iconic biker movie released upon the American psyche, Easy Rider, an American independent road drama written by Peter Fonda, Dennis Hopper, Terry Southern, produced by Fonda, directed by Hopper, very successful. Fonda and Hopper play two bikers, not club members, not Hells Angels, just dudes who love the open road, who travel to the American Southwest and the South carrying around the proceeds from a cocaine deal.

Nabs $60 million at the box office, generally considered a classic, especially for bikers, influenced a lot of people to go out there and buy a bike, hit the open road, generally considered a classic, especially for bikers, influenced a lot of people to go out there and buy a bike, hit the open road. Thanks to a lot of free promo, the Hells Angels continued to expand internationally before the 60s are over. On July 30th, 1969, the first European charter is issued in London. Two charters will be issued, one in South London, one in East London, and then they will merge into a single club in 1973. December of 1969, the Mongols Motorcycle Club, established in Montebello, California, east of Los Angeles. The Mongols will become the AHA's biggest MC rivals, battle for control of Southern California.

Like the Hells Angels, most of the early members are military, a lot of Vietnam vets this time, who are used to a strict code of silence, respect, and camaraderie, according to the Mongols' website. The Mongols and Hell's Angels have fought for turf, fought, and killed each other for many years, ever since the Mongols formed. Law enforcement estimates around 5,000 current Mongol members. Other sources reference about 2,000 members. 1998, an ATF agent, William Queen, infiltrated a Mongols' chapter, eventually became a full-patch member, rose to the rank of chapter vice president using the undercover alias of Billy St. John.

In April of 2000, based on evidence gathered during a, during Queen's 28 month undercover time with the club, 54 Mongols were arrested. All but one of the accused later convicted of crimes, including drug trafficking, motorcycle theft, and conspiracy to commit murder.

So another club, much like the HA. Yet another powerful outlaw M.C. also formed back in 1969 in Ohio. One that has battled for territory with the H.A. in the Midwest for decades now. And they are also one of

today's sponsors. Today's Time Suck is brought to you by the Cleveland Steamers Motorcycle Club. Hey, I'm Tuz Martinez, founder, godfather, and original charter president for the Cleveland Steamers Motorcycle Club. Hey, I'm Toots Martinez, founder, godfather, and original charter president for the Cleveland Steamers Motorcycle Club, and I just want to take a moment to set a few things straight. One, the Cleveland Steamers are not a criminal organization. We're an organization full of a lot of criminals, so make of that what you will and come to the clubhouse

behind the old Homestead Cavern off of Norwood in the St. Clair, Superior part of town if you're interested in keeping your mouth shut and making some cash. Two, my toot's nickname continues to be greatly misunderstood. It's in regards to the sound that my first bike used to make when I started up when I was a kid. It's not in reference to any sort of flatulence. Three, also greatly misunderstood is our club name, the Cleveland Steamers. When I came up with that name in 1969, I picked it as a way to reference steam coming off of a dead body. Maybe someone I killed for getting smart, or ratting on me, or checking out my old lady. That's what I was thinking, and I still think it's very cool and tough. I had no idea that the term Cleveland Steamer would later be used to define a disgusting, degrading, and in my mind, abusive sexual act, where a man defecates on a female's chest before then thrusting his penis in between her breasts until orgasm,

using his own feces as lube, a steamer name referencing the steam produced by the freshness of the dookie, you know, moisture rising from it when the temperature of said feces is greater than the surrounding air. The Cleveland part? No one knows why my city was chosen to be included in that disgusting act. Maybe we're supposed to be animals or something due to a high concentration of Poles living in the area. I don't know. I do know I'll kill whoever came up with that term if I find out.

So I say all this to say, please, if you do come by our clubhouse, please don't make any poop or fart or dirty sex jokes about either my nickname Or the club nickname Which have obviously Become intertwined Over the years Due to unfortunate

Circumstances So again Come by if you're serious But do not make jokes Happy riding And remember our motto The Cleveland Steamers When there's barbarians

At the gate You gotta drop a deuce And do not joke About our motto either That's a sore spot I came up with that Not knowing the barbarians at the gate was slang for having a butt burrito in the oven. And by dropping a deuce, I meant killing a snitch.

That's what we called it in My Neighbor is a Kid. Anyway, if you're serious about trying to join the Cleveland Steamers, first you gotta pass the toots test. God damn it. That didn't come out the way I wanted it to either. I don't know. I'll just eat the clubhouse. Ask for toots.

Okay. I think I'm done with the Cleveland Steamer MC Gag now. I think. I'm quite fond of it. I could have done that for half an hour. Then probably lost, I don't know, 70% of you. But I would have had fun. Cleveland, not joking, has had a strong Hells Angels presence for years.

A charter was established in 1967. And as recently as the summer of 2020, members got into a violent biker brawl, July 29th of the last year, in Valley View, a quiet suburb about 11 miles south of Cleveland. Members of the Hells Angels brawled with the Mongols in a parking lot of a Shell gas station.

A fight ended with one member of the Mongols stabbed and a Hells Angel member dead from a gunshot wound. The fight rumored to be fought over drug turf. H.A. has a strong presence in Ohio. Mongols trying to move in. Back to the 60s now. The most national exposure the H.A. received that decade probably came from an incident that happened on December 6, 1969. Similar to the gang rape accusation from Monterey, this also would not be great exposure

and would further cement this group in a lot of people's minds as being primarily a criminal and violent organization. The incident occurred at a Rolling Stones concert held at Altamont Speedway in Northern California. And what a fucking concert it was. Oh my God. The lineup was in order of appearance, Santana, Jefferson Airplane, the Flying Burrito Brothers, Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young, and the Rolling Stones taking the stage as the final act. Really had to fight hard against inserting a Michael McDonald reference there. Just want that noted for the record. Holy shit, what an epic lineup, though.

26-year-old Jagger, fresh off the Let It Bleed album. The Flying Burrito Brothers, weird name I know. They just released Gilded Palace of Sin, an album Rolling Stone recently placed at 192 on the list of 500 best albums ever. Jefferson Airplane, Crosby, Sills, Nash & Young at the peak of their fame or close to it. Santana, just 22 years old, just getting started, just getting recognized as a guitar phenom. Grateful Dead was supposed to play that day too, right before the Stones. Listed on the poster, but they declined to step on stage due to escalating violence at the concert. Shit got crazy.

Roughly 300,000 fans gathered at the Altamont Speedway in the town of Tracy, California, about 60 miles east of the San Francisco Bay, way more than promoters expected. It was a free concert promoted as Woodstock West, also supposed to be a triumphant conclusion for the Stones. A documentary crew was in tow following one of their first wildly successful U.S. headlining tours. And I love that they just wrapped up yet another super successful U.S. headlining tour in 2021, 52 years later. This 1969 show would not be remembered for the music. The event marred by violent confrontations between the Hells Angels, who were hired to do security by Mick Jagger himself, according to Sonny Barger, and a larger than expected crowd high on a lot of different drugs. By the time the Stones took the stage

for the concert's finale, various members of the Angels had already been accused of taking their security enforcement a little too seriously, being needlessly aggressive and violent with the crowd. And one Angel even knocked out Marty Ballin of the band Jefferson Airplane,

punched him in the fucking face. Interesting way to run concert security, to fucking knock out one of the people in the bands. Punch him in the fucking face. Interesting way to run concert security, to fucking knock out one of the people in the bands. In addition to the Angels fans, rowdy as fuck that day. The Stones arrived via a helicopter, and right after they landed, when Mick Jagger walked out, some random dude just

ran up to him and punched him in the face. Shit was nuts. Fans had abandoned cars on the freeway nearby when gridlock was going to cause them to miss the concert. Just fucking left their car, started walking. One fan on the way even fell into a ditch, drowned and died. So much drugs.

During the stone set, a hell's angel, Alan Pissarro, stabbed to death a fan, Meredith Hunter, who was 18 in the middle of a scuffle. Hunter though was waving a gun and an autopsy did show he was high as fuck on meth. These moments captured in the classic 1970 documentary fan or film, Gimme Shelter.

You can find a portion of that too online showing Mick Jagger looking over the footage and seeing as he's singing on stage when somebody is getting stabbed at his concert. Mr. Pissarro pled self-defense and he was acquitted. But now the world associated the Hells Angels further with violence. I don't think in this instance, it was the fault of the Angels.

This guy died. I mean, the dude was fucked up on meth, pulled a gun out at a concert, started threatening people. I mean, what were they supposed to? Ask him kindly to please leave. March 7th, 1971, more biker violence. This one probably is the Angels' fault. Brawl breaks out at a motorcycle trade show in Cleveland

between the Breed MC from Ohio and the New York chapter of the Hells Angels. Battle lasts for 10 minutes. Rivals clash with knives, chains, and clubs. Like this is out of a movie. This is when people talk about like a biker battle. You picture dudes with the fucking leather jackets beating each other with chains and knives

and fucking shooting each other in like a parking lot or some shit, hitting each other with clubs. That actually happened here. Five bikers killed, including Jeffrey Grover Coffey of the New York chapter of the Angels. Police charged 57 members of the combined gangs with murder. Three days later, on March 10th, 1971, Hell's Angels from all over the country gather for the funeral of Mr. Coffey.

That angel killed in the Cleveland brawl. And was it? Yeah, yeah, exactly. Cleveland steamers not involved. While in Manhattan on the same day, eight angels arrested in connection with the rape of a 17-year-old girl in a leather goods store. That gets them a ton more bad press

as it should have, Jesus. By April of 1971, with all the negative vibes, you know, coming out of the Hells Angels camp, people in New York start questioning their proximity to the H.A. Clubhouse. People are fucking scared nationwide of the angels now.

Not seen as rough around the edges, but cool friends of the counterculture, just seen as thugs. November 1st, 1972, three Hells Angels arrested after the bodies of two men and a woman found buried at a ranch near Ukiah, California. The arrests and deaths add to the growing sentiment that the bikers are, you know, large-scale organized crime operators. The New York Times lists all the towns affected by HA violence since the movie The Wild Ones came out. Hollister, California, right? Angels Camp, California. Rodeo, California. Monterey. Willits and Bass Lake. Madeira. Laconia, New Hampshire. Watsonville, California. Cloverdale.

Narcotics violations. Beatings, stabbings, stompings, shootings, rapes, and riots. In the 70s, despite all the bad press, maybe because of it, angels continue to open up new chapters around the globe. One of the next countries that they really saturate after the US is not surprisingly Canada. And in Canada, one of the baddest angels who ever lived killed an awful lot of people on behalf of the club. Yves Trudeau, commonly known as Apache.

Trudeau widely regarded as being the most prolific hitman in Hell's Angels history, with admittedly 43 murders to his name. Trudeau, born in Quebec, 1946. Small kid who grew into a small man, 5'6", weighed about 135 pounds. Don't think anyone saw a bike gang enforcer in his future, in his early years.

In the early 60s, while still a teenager, he held a job at Canadian Industries Limited where he learned how to work with explosives and that would not be good for the world. That training would later come in handy as he orchestrated several bombings. In addition to being called Apache, another nickname he had was the Mad Bumper.

Bumper likely referring to his ability to bump off or kill people. Towards the end of the 60s, he joined the Popeyes Motorcycle Club, the largest outlaw motorcycle club in Quebec at the time. Overall, the second largest outlaw MC club in Canada. On December 5th, 1977, the Popeyes patched over by the Hells Angels, making them the first Canadian chapter for the Hells Angels based in Montreal. Hells Angels, way better name than Popeyes.

Popeyes Motorcycle Club sounds like a biker-themed sandwich shop. motorcycle club sounds like a biker-themed sandwich shop. A number of the members of the Montreal-based Hells Angels, including Trudeau, then left the chapter in September of 79, formed the Laval chapter of the Angels, Laval located in southwestern Quebec, north of Montreal. This chapter would go on to become known as the north chapter of the Canadian Hells Angels. And Trudeau, allegedly the first of the Canadian Hells Angels members to earn one of those filthy few patches, filthy few forever, 666, for carrying out murders on behalf of the club. Fast forward, after turning police informant

during a one-year sentence for illegal weapons charges, he becomes a very valuable asset to law enforcement. When the H.A. finds out he's turned on them, a 50,000 price is put out in his head. 1956, he makes a deal to plead guilty to 43 counts of involuntary manslaughter, even though many of the murders that he was involved in were planned and carried out by himself. As part of the plea, he's sentenced to life in prison, but eligible for parole after just seven fucking years.

In the deal, he named a total of 95 murders, only 34 of whom were known, 34 of those murders were actually known by law enforcement at that time. A lot of those people just thought to be missing. His statements led to 13 members of the HA being convicted of serious crimes, including murder. But they're not a criminal organization. On June 13th, 1979, the federal government goes RICO on the Hells Angels, the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act. Clearly, Uncle Sam sees the HA as organized crime. RICO is an act relating to the control of organized crime that allows for extending penalties of crimes to throw harsher penalties at crime syndicates. Federal officers now indict 33 Hells Angels on federal racketeer-influenced

and corrupt organization statutes after large-scale raids. The Bureau of Charges of the club has turned into a full-time criminal organization in drug trafficking, or had turned into one by the mid-60s. Sonny Barger defends the HA against these accusations in a Washington Post interview in October of 79. He says while being held on a $1 million bail at the San Francisco County Jail, I can tell you why they want to get rid of the Hells Angels, what I think. First of all, we're a virtual army. We're all across the country and now we're in foreign countries also. And they have no idea

how many of us are there. We have money, many allies that are outlaw bikers that are not Hells Angels that would probably do anything we asked them to if something happened. And the reporter asked something like what? And Sonny says, well, maybe like a revolution or anything like that. They know we're basically the most probably well-armed people in the US. We've never taken a political stance on anything other than that one time against the VDC, the Vietnam Day Committee, whose 1965 any war parade was broken up

by Hell's Angels in Oakland. And at that time I thought we were right, but I've done 180 degrees in that sense. And I think that scares the authorities. This untold number of people that really have no fear of dying for what they believe in. And they're armed and they won't commit themselves to one side or the other. And I think that's

where it lies. So, you know, he thinks that the government is scared of the angels because, you know, if they ever chose to come across the, you know, come after the government, they'd be a real problem. I think he's, I think he's overstating how tough the Hells Angels were. I mean, yes, tough members, but they don't have enough numbers to take on the country. Angels were. I mean, yes, tough members, but they don't have enough numbers to take on the country. In his autobiography, Barger will later say about this Rico case, when the Hells Angels went to trial in October of 79, nobody had ever beaten Rico. Nobody. If you were arrested, it was time to panic because you were as good as guilty. You couldn't beat it. The power of a Rico charge generally meant plead guilty and make a deal fast. The Hells Angels

were the first to lock arms, stand tall, and go to trial. So this further, you know, cements their status as fucking tough guys. July 2nd, 1980, after eight months, a mistrial is declared in the prosecution of members of the AHA, including Sonny Barger. The jury fails to reach a verdict on the racketeering charges against 18 defendants, but does find them guilty of nine of the remaining 12 lesser charges. Mr. Barger, excuse me, one of two angels to take the stand in his own defense. He acknowledged his own use and sale of drugs, but denied any conspiracy saying, although the angels were like a family, it was wrong to believe that whatever a hell's angel does something or that whenever a hell's angel does something, all the angels are responsible. Again, not a criminal organization, just an organization composed of a lot of criminals. Mr. Barger leaves jail on a bond

a month later and the racketeering charges against him are dropped. So he won. 1983, Hell's Angels Forever, a documentary is released. This film describes itself as the true story of an American phenomenon. Starts from the premise that the Brotherhood of Motorcyclists has long been the target of a conspiracy by law enforcement authorities aimed at its destruction. The film is co-produced by Sandy Alexander, described as the founding president of the New York chapter of the Angels. Members of the club hold what is possibly their first full-fledged news conference to promote this movie. So this is a documentary produced by the Hells Angels about the Hells Angels. I watched the whole thing.

I was pretty surprised. In their own production, they come across as exactly the stereotype I had of the Hells Angels. I watched the whole thing. I was pretty surprised. In their own production, they come across as exactly the stereotype I had of them before watching it. A bunch of bike-loving thugs, real tough, loyal to their brothers, maybe not real smart overall, and do a lot of horrible shit. And this doc is their chance to pull away from that stereotype. They do this funny thing over and over where they talk a lot about being outlaws and living free, but they're not criminals They'll talk about beating the fuck out of people For basically just being slightly disrespected

Talk a lot about women Basically being their property and having to smack them around From time to time and women in the doc talk about How they deserve to be smacked around from time to time That's just life These guys are hammered and high as fuck while you know Messing around with guns and fucking with cops They spend a lot of time trying to defend why they don't allow black members while also mixing a lot of concert footage

of black performers, having fun with them because they're not racist. They just think that in some ways you should stick with your own kind. And they just keep giving these constant mixed messages. We're not about violence, but we love to beat people up. We respect the hell out of women, but we got to smack them around when they speak at a turn. We have no problem with black people, but fucking stay out of our club. We're not criminals. We just never follow the law. And we make our money doing shit like running drugs and running guns. It's like, they know that the truth is that they're fucking dirtbags who love riding and getting rowdy with other dirtbags, but they don't feel comfortable just explicitly saying that. A lot of footage of them partying, a lot of talk about how

they always have each other's backs. Basically, if you're a white dude who is super anti-establishment and cool with going to prison, it's a great group for you. These guys will have your back. And having your back eventually will probably mean you'll get words of moral support while you rot in prison. But hey, they're going to think well of you

while you die in prison. They're your buddies. I don't know. The more I've learned about them, the more they are exactly who I thought they were going to be. The stereotype fits. Love watching shows about them,

like Sons of Anarchy, but no need to hang out in their clubhouse. May 2nd, 1985, widespread raids and arrests of Hells Angels organizations throughout the Northeast result in Connecticut trooper, a Connecticut trooper being shot. More violence. 1994, a violent feud breaks out in Denmark between the Hells Angels and other clubs, including the Morticians and the Banditos. Man, Morticians. That's a badass MC name. The Bad Magicians would actually be a good name for an MC. But I can't be a member. I'm just not that outlaw.

But wearing a cool vest, riding a stick, customized Harley. That sounds fun. Anyways, the violence soon spreads through Northern Europe, continues for nearly four years, from January of 1994 to September of 1997. It's called the Nordic Biker War, or the Second Biker War, to distinguish it from the earlier Copenhagen Biker War, which went from 1983 to 1985. Conflicts arose from disputes over territory, organized crime rackets, as well as personal

feuds within biker subculture. As a result of this 1996-97 conflict, 138 people sentenced to a total of 240 years in prison. Back to Eve's Apache Trudeau for a moment. 1994, he receives an early release from prison and as part of his parole deal, receives a new identity, going by the name of Dennis Cote now. So he barely spent any time in prison, you know, for killing 43 fucking people.

Upon release, he begins to work at a series of odd jobs, including working in an elderly care facility, driving a bus for mentally disabled people. In 2000, he finds himself out of work and begins a downwards slide, living off welfare, unemployment, insurance payments, then sexually assaults a boy under the age of 14, which sees him convicted in 2004

and sent back to prison for just four years. What the fuck? Believed that the sexual assaults have been happening since September of 2007. Pleased guilty to six counts of sexual exploitation, sexual interference, and invitation to sexual touching of a male victim under the age of 14.

In 2006, diagnosed with bone marrow cancer, and in 2008, granted early parole with release to an outside medical facility. Eve's Apache Trudeau dies in 2008 at the age of 62. And good riddance. What a fucking dirtbag. Back to the main timeline now.

We're in the 90s. January 3rd, 1994, fight and a shutdown of the New York clubhouse. A federal lawsuit is filed to take away the Hell's Angel clubhouse at 77 East 3rd Street in Manhattan under a 1984 law that allows the government to seize property used in drug trafficking. The angels lawyer insists the details,

the government's case are wrong as is public perception of the club saying in the hell's angels. There are probably some people you wouldn't want to have over for dinner, but the media hype about them has been exaggerated. The New York city chapter is incorporated under New York state law as a religious nonprofit organization. So the group can, you know,

fight seizure and it works. That's pretty funny. We have to file that away. Some assholes ever try and come for the suck dungeon. Well, we're going to transition into the church of Nimrod. March 28th, 2001,

the Canadian police arrest about 120 members and associates of the Hells Angels in the Quebec biker wars, the nineties. So many Canadian bikers. These arrests lead to years of trials and prison sentences against the Angels in Canada, including a life sentence for the gang's presumed leader, Montreal Chapter President Maurice Mambouchet,

and the killing of two prison guards. And this guy, Bouchet, we could do a whole suck on him. He's a real piece of work. Lot of information out there on him. Convicted rapist, a guy suspected strongly in so many murders, in addition to the two that sent him to prison. Dude got patched into the chapter he became president of for murder,

in all likelihood. More arrests made in 2009. And all the police believe that more than 150 deaths can be related to the Quebec biker wars, including that of an 11-year-old bystander. April 27, 2002, big brawl between Hells Angels and the Mongols breaks out in Harris Casino in Laughlin, Nevada. I remember the press around this. The River Run Riot. Three men, a Mongol and two angels, killed in the fight over a territorial dispute that arose during an annual biker

rally. 60 to 70 people armed with guns and knives are involved. Hotel security cameras captured it all. You can find several videos online. Fucking chaos on the casino floor. People playing their slot machines one minute, and the next they're in the middle of a fucking biker brawl where people are getting killed.

The conflict began when members of the Angels went to Harrah's to confront members of the Mongols because a police officer told them their club brothers were surrounded by Mongols. Big brawl breaks out. Mongol Anthony Barrera, 43, stabbed to death. Two Hells Angels, Jeremy Bell, 27 And Robert Tumulty, 50, are shot to death

Six members of the Angels, as well as six members of the Mongols Sent to prison as a result of this event Fast forward to March 2006 Hells Angels in the news again for suing Walt Disney Over trademark infringement for an upcoming John Travolta movie Seriously They sued over the planned Wild Hogs movie that did, you know, obviously come out

for infringing on their trademark name and Death Head logo. This is one of numerous suits the club has filed to protect its brand over the years, including one against the fashion house of Alexander McQueen in 2010. Interesting dudes. They stab, shoot, rape, deal narcotics, and sue for trademark infringement.

That last one doesn't seem as outlaw-ish as the others. And the timeline continues to the present day with lots and lots of additional arrests. Just in the past year, so many articles pop up from all around the world with just a quick search. In June, all right, in 2021, New Jersey, members of the Pagans Motorcycle Club arrested and charged with aggravated assault in aid of racketeering. Several pagans brutally assaulted an associate of the Hells Angels at a gas station in Newark. Victim was beaten with an axe handle, punched and kicked, causing significant injuries. Two angels arrested in New York's Hudson Valley this past June for cocaine and illegal assault weapons possession. Still in June, in Modesto, California, Hells

Angel chapter vice president pleads guilty to drug racketeering. September, police raid a Hells Angels clubhouse in Germany. The raid related to the investigation of a murder and dismemberment of another gang member. Last month in Marbella, Spain, three Hells Angels arrested shortly after 13 others had been arrested in Denmark for international drug trafficking charges. November 5th, just a few weeks ago, a bunch of Hells Angels members arrested in Quebec and 370 pounds of cocaine, roughly 170 kilograms, and a bunch of assault rifles and randomly a bunch of Hells Angels members arrested in Quebec, and 370 pounds of cocaine, roughly 170 kilograms, and a bunch of assault rifles, and randomly a bunch of fucking crossbows are confiscated. Who the fuck's using crossbows in 2021? A few days later, November 9th, three HA members arrested

in Brisbane, Australia, $3 million worth of drugs and a stash of assault rifles confiscated. On and on it goes. To finish sucking these Hell's angels, let's now step out of today's timeline. Good job, soldier. You've made it back. Barely. So are the HA still dangerous today? Still largely a criminal organization? I would have to say, fuck yeah. So dangerous. Don't fuck with them. As far as organized crime, though, I guess I will say yes and no. Right? As far as, I mean, I just said yes, I know, a second ago. Are they an organized criminal organization? Yes, asterisk. Some of their chapters seem based

on arrest records to be, you know, very violent. I would say a lot of their chapters for sure deeply involved in organized crime. Other chapters do not, maybe they're just better not getting caught or they stay away from criminal acts, at least mostly. I don't know. But again, why would you devote yourself to a chapter that asks for you to put, you know, their needs above everyone else's, even your family's, unless you're, uh, you know, going to be making some money with them and they're not selling again, baked goods. You can't, you know, buy and wear their patches, even if you're not a member. So how do they goods. You can't, you know, buy and wear their patches even if you're not a member.

So how do they make money illegally? You know, they also do do some good stuff. It wouldn't be right not to mention that. A banner on the bottom of the Hells Angels national website does read, when we do right, nobody remembers, but when we do wrong, nobody forgets. Chapters have done plenty of charity runs,

other philanthropic work. Chapters raising money hundreds of times. In Fresno, California in 2014, on done plenty of charity runs, other philanthropic work chapters, raising money hundreds of times on Fresno, California in 2014 on black Friday, for example, members of the hell's angels motorcycle club who've been camping out at the store, you know, uh, bought out every bicycle in the store over 200 promptly donated them to the Poverello house, a local nonprofit dedicated to helping the homeless and the needy. So hail Nimrod to that, uh, to recap the hell's angels. They really are hail Nimrod to that. To recap, the Hells Angels, they really are outlaws. It's not just about riding. It's about brotherhood. And that brotherhood, unfortunately, looks a bit too much like the Aryan brotherhood, sometimes in some ways. But for the

brothers, they really do seem to mostly have each other's backs. A lot of accounts of guys being able to trust each other more than anyone else in their lives, they say. Lifelong fraternity bonded, first over a love of motorcycles, second by love of being an outlaw. They formed their own society within a society. And in many ways, their society is not so great. There does seem to be a lot of twisted honor in it though, too. They rarely turn on one another. They really do back each other's plays. They take care of one another. I didn't say it before, but clubs often take care of members' families when members are in prison. They do support one another, but at what cost does that support come? That's what I just kept

thinking about. The cost of never being able to put your family first. The cost of always being worried about getting arrested. The cost of having to kick the shit out of someone, maybe killing them, just to make sure you back up your brother's play. The cost of going on a run instead of being there for your kid's birthday, et cetera, et cetera. I don't know. Overall, I can think of a lot of better organizations to spend your time with, but I'm not going to tell them that. Not in their faces, at least. I don't know if I'm brave as brave as Hunter S. Thompson.

I guess I, you know, hope that if I saw some dude hit a woman in front of me, I would say something, but man, the ass whooping that would follow would not be fun. Please, if you have to be my ass, Hells Angels, take it easy on my neck and spine. If you're going to stomp me, please, you know,

if you could try and avoid my neck and spine, that'd be fucking great. And maybe my eyes and my cock and balls. I'm partial to my spine, which I guess does include my neck. I'm partial to my whole spine and my peepers and my peen and my arms and legs and my head.

I like my skull. There's a lot of body parts when I really think about it that I'd like to keep. Last week, I might've given you, you know, my one wonky toe, but I finally have that one in a good place. I think it's fixed. Anyway, what a fascinating subculture, Harley riding soldiers out there wearing cuts like military uniforms. Interesting how Hollywood and World War II influenced their beginnings. I didn't know about the World War II connection at all before. Helped them grow and gather members. Really, who is the HA? Here's a

quote I really like from that 1983 doc of theirs. A producer asked, what are the Hells Angels really like? And a big tatted up biker answers, there are as many answers to that as there are Hells Angels. Now let's look at today's top five takeaways. at today's top five takeaways. Time shock, top five takeaways. Number one, if you want to be an HA member, don't be black, be a dude. Be an expert on Harleys, ride a Harley.

Be willing to make everything else in your life take a backseat to the angels. Don't care a lot about women. Be prepared to probably go to prison at some point and definitely get some blood in your knuckles. Number two, despite clubs spread across five continents, there aren't actually that many patched in HA members. Just 2,500 or so and only around 800 in the US. Getting patched in, not an easy feat. Number three, the one percenter comes from the idea that 99% of the millions of people who love to ride motorcycles are not

outlaws. And that only around 1% want to do shit like, you know, run guns and meth. Number four, there has been at least one H.A. Patchton member that shows up on some serial killing websites. Eve's Apache Trudeau, Canada's most prolific hitman, who turned into a valuable police informant, who turned into a pedophile, who finally, thankfully, turned up dead.

Number five, new info. Let's go back to talking about Hunter S. Thompson for a second, the gonzo journalist who really put the angels on the national counterculture map first. In her book on Thompson called Hunter, the Strange and Savage Life of Hunter S. Thompson, Thompson biographer, E. Jean Carroll,

starts the first chapter with a detailed account of the legendary excesses of her subject. I fucking love how ridiculous this dude was. I don't know how he lived so long. Reminds me of a guy named Tony that I used to know many years ago. Might not want his last name out there. God, that guy could party hard and just day after day. But here's what Carol reports as a sample daily routine for the gonzo journalist in his working prime. Note that his day begins at 3 p.m. I had to interrupt Lindsay doing some work yesterday. She was doing work and I had to interrupt her and read this whole thing to her. Cause I was just,

I thought it was so funny. 3 p.m. This is his day. This is Hunter S. Thompson's. This is his daily routine, I guess, for quite some time in the prime of his life. 3 p.m. rise. 3 0 5 p.m. Chivas Regal on the rocks with the morning papers. He starts his day with fucking whiskey. He starts his day with fucking whiskey. Dunhill cigarettes, 3.45 p.m. That's some lines of cocaine. 3.50 p.m. Another glass of Chivas, more Dunhills.

4.05 p.m. First cup of coffee, more Dunhills. 4.15 p.m. More cocaine. 4.16. Orange juice, more Dunhills. At least you got some juice in. It's the first nutrients of the day.

Love this next section. This is her documenting this. 4.30, cocaine. 4.54, cocaine. 5.05, cocaine. 5.11, coffee, Dunhill's. 5.30, more ice for the Chivas. 5.45, cocaine.

6, some weed to take the edge off the day. 7.05, causing grass in this account. 705, Woody Creek Tavern for lunch. Heineken, two margaritas, coleslaw, taco salad, double order of fried onion rings, carrot cake. How the fuck did he stay alive? Ice cream, bean fritter, Dunhill's, another Heineken. Cocaine, and for the ride home, a snow cone that was a glass of shredded

ice over which is poured three or four jiggers of Chivas. 9 p.m. Start snorting cocaine, quote, seriously. It's been doing bumps before that. 10 p.m. Drops acid. 11 p.m. Chartrereuse which is a liqueur made from brandy cocaine, grass 11.30pm, cocaine god this guy loves coke midnight, now Hunter S. Thompson is ready to write from 12.05 to 6am, chartreuse cocaine, grass, shivas

coffee, Heineken, clove cigarettes grapefruit, Dunhill's, orange juice gin, continuous pornographic movies and some writing 6am., heads of the hot tub, champagne, dove bars, fucking fettuccine Alfredo. What? Okay. So random. 8 a.m., Halcyon, which is a sleep medication. 8.20 a.m. finally goes to sleep, and then rinse and repeat. What a schedule. Wow. Not sure many angels could hang with that for long. And Thompson lived until the age of 67 and bad health didn't kill him.

A self-inflicted gunshot wound did. Dude often remarked, I hate to advocate drugs, alcohol, violence, or insanity to anyone, but they've always worked for me. For his funeral service, Johnny Depp shot Hunter's ashes out of a fucking cannon, per his wishes.

Time suck, top five takeaways. The Hells Angels have been sucked and snuck in a little Hunter S. Thompson lore there. God, I love that last part. That is the most ridiculous working schedule. Thank you to the Bad Magic Productions team for all their help in making time suck every week. Queen of Bad Magic, Lindsay Cummins Doing so many things to give me the time To polish all the research and do so much additional research And record these shows

Reverend Dr. Joe Paisley Also doing so many things around the Suck Dungeon Thanks to the script keeper, Zach Flannery For the initial research this week Did a great job Thanks to Bid Elixir for keeping the Time Suck app running smooth Logan the Art Warlock Keith, our creative director, creating all the merch at badmagicmerch.com and more.

Thanks also to Liz, the enchantress Hernandez, for helping Logan with socials, for running the Cult of the Curious 2 private Facebook page, along with her wonderful All Seeing Eyes moderators. Thanks to Beefsteak and his mod squad, keeping over 10,000 meat sacks happy over on Discord. What should we suck next week? I know this is not very holiday-like,

but I want to suck a modern-day serial killer. The freeway killer, Billy Gutterballs. Last one we sucked way back in September. Yes, there's been Boone Helm, Kentucky Cannibal. Yes, Dr. Satan, Marcel Petiot. But not a lot of details with either one of them due to when they did what they did. After next week, we'll be doing a fun, weird one

with cryptids, Appalachian cryptids. Then something inspirational to close out the year per our tradition. So let's go dark as fuck next week with the Ken and Barbie killers. Paul Bernardo,

with the help of his wife, Carla Homolka, I'll learn how to say her last name next week, played a Canadian suburb in the late 80s with a series of horrific rapes that were only the tip of the iceberg. In 1990, the two young, attractive Canadians began a sadistic killing spree. Before Bernardo was put behind bars for multiple murders, tortures, rapes, he was a salesman who lured female victims using pickups and pitches he

learned from his day job. He studied how to entice women like he studied how to do well in sales. Also, he read the classic horror novel, American Psycho, like his Bible, quote. And when he met and married Carla, his statistic streak increased. She encouraged his behavior. In the end, Paul was found to be responsible for at least 13 rapes and perhaps four killings. Carla charged with two murders thanks to a plea deal. She was involved with a lot more than that, though. Prosecutors would make a real,

quote, deal with the devil with her. The press, the public was furious. She is out living free right now. And once you hear what she did, you will hope she is living nowhere near you or anyone you care about. The Ken and Barbie Killers next from medical meat sack, Lauren Dourish. Lauren writes, Hey there, sorry for the lack of witty salutations. I have a lot going on in my brain right now. After listening to the most recent suck on opioids, I've worked in healthcare for more than 10 years. And my husband is an addictions counselor at a drug treatment center. I've worked in primary care and mental health centers and have a lot of thoughts about the most recent suck. I have a lot of respect for the stance you take on opioids and want to provide some context from the aspect of someone who works in healthcare.

I have a massive amount of empathy for those who find themselves addicted to opioids. I have genuinely seen lives completely destroyed by addiction. I've also seen people who genuinely have no other options for controlling chronic pain other than opioids. The most important new info I have to provide is how little education most doctors have on pain management. The medical doctor of a non-profit health care organization I previously worked for told me that in all of his medical education, he had less than six hours in education on pain management. He would refer chronic pain patients to pain management doctors to offer non-opioid options for managing their pain, but these providers were booked out for 12 months or more,

and the cost of care was absolutely out of reach for our uninsured patients. He's left with a difficult decision, prescribe an opioid that the patient has been taking for years or leave them without care and in pain and risk their well-being and a negative review. Many may go to Google or Yelp to complain that their doctor is not addressing their concerns regarding their pain. Most healthcare administrators, myself included, are stuck in the middle

when we ask them about what happened with that patient when there is a negative review of their services. They wanted a prescription for Oxy, but the doc wouldn't give it to them because of pressure against prescribing opioids. Are they drug-seeking or just a patient in chronic pain who has no other options? It's hard to determine in the 15 or 20 minutes we give them to meet with their patient. No one wins in this situation. The doctor feels bad. They couldn't help the patient. The patient is still in pain, and the administrators are left to deal with the blowback. Many docs, even the most well-intentioned, may prescribe an

opioid because it will solve that patient's concern, make them happy, and keep admins off their back. If you read this, please give a shout out to my amazing husband, Jason, who is in the trenches every day fighting for his patients. Jason is blind, so blind he says that if you throw something at him, he won't duck. And he kicks ass every day. He said multiple former patients reach out and tell them that he's the reason they're clean and sober and has made a real honest to God impact on their lives. He may be disabled, but he's out there saving lives

and giving a shit about the addicts that everyone else has given up on. He's a fucking superhero. And the reason I wake up every day and decide to be a better person and be a shining light for others. We met online in 2008 and my life is infinitely better for having met him. His passion, empathy, dedication, and universal love for all humanity

is a source of inspiration for everyone around him. He's a beacon of light in the darkness of addiction for many, and a fucking beautiful person. If you need another good charity to donate to, I urge you to donate to Guide Dogs for the Blind in California. They give people like my husband the gift of independence through providing dogs to the visually impaired completely free of charge. They have paid for three dogs for Jason and paid for every penny of veterinary care from birth to death. His dog goes with him to all his sessions with his clients. And even though she isn't a therapy dog, has the ability to calm and help his patients through just her presence in the room. Not sorry for the long email. Please be sure to thank Bojangles for his canine brethren

who take care and lead those who cannot see. Yours, Lauren Dourish in Denton, Texas. Well, thank you, Lauren, putting that charity suggestion on our list of possible future charities to donate to. Praise Bojangles. They sound fantastic. As does your husband, as do you. You sound like an incredibly smart, caring, and passionate person. Nimrod is so pleased. And yeah, we got to figure out how to help these doctors, help them, you know, be educated more. And I don't know how you fix too much demand and not enough, you know, people working in that field. You know, that's just up to hopefully more people choose to become doctors and choose to become doctors specializing in non-opioid pain therapy. And yeah, similar professions. And what a mess our healthcare system is in, in some ways, huh? But also, some shit is inherently messy. Like,

how could it not be messy? Opioids are messy. Highly addictive, but God, so good at what they do. You know, if you're dealing with severe chronic pain, is being addicted to opioids worse than all the pain? For some people, no. Thanks to all the scientists out there working to fix problems like this. Thanks for the scientific method and scientific progress, right?

Smart people doing research to figure out how to improve the positive effects of opioids, pain relief, minimize the negative effects like addiction in this example. I think, you know, eventually, if, you know, we keep education going and hopefully fund education more

in this country and others, create more smart people, give them the tools to, you know, do smart research and improve our lives, we'll figure out this mess and others like it. Helpful Sack, Tony West now shares another solid opioid update.

Writing, hey Dan, another great episode that covers drugs. Thank you. Former crack and opioid addict that has contacted you before, here to thank you again for spreading the facts. I wouldn't wish addiction on my worst enemy. And I wanted to add a few things. First off, I wanted to bring attention to one of the other dangers of opioids, a compromised immune system. Most people don't know this and assume opioid withdrawals are not deadly, which they're not on their own, but they can lead to death. I don't know this,

or I'm sorry, I didn't know this and actually almost died of an infection when I was going through fentanyl withdrawals because my immune system was so weak. Second, many cities have a Narcan distribution program that makes it available without a prescription and they're worth looking into, even for the off chance of saving a stranger. Figured this info could save some lives and wanted to share it. Thanks for all you do and hail Lucifina Hail Lucifina! Tony with an I Thank you for the tip on the Narcan distribution programs Other suckers have written about this as well Yes, good to have that stuff on hand

Whether you use it or not, maybe it'll be around someone who uses it As you say, you know, you could save a stranger's life Save a friend's life, save a family member's life And good on you For overcoming addictions to both crack and opioids. You're a fucking superhero. Now for a big old opioid update from a super sec who has been through the fucking ringer. Been through it. Dearest Dan, the angel who sucks on high. First of all, just wanted to thank you. You read an update of mine a few weeks ago and it just so

happened I heard it only hours after my fiance broke things off. Ah, shit, man. I'm sorry. It made an incredibly dark moment so much lighter and easier to handle. I've always struggled with mental health issues as well as substance abuse issues. And your podcast and the community around it has helped me feel like I belong somewhere for the first time in a long time. I found your podcast about a year and a half ago, started with episode one, finally caught up this week. I wanted to write you and tell you about my experience with the opioid epidemic as someone

who grew up in an area that has been hit especially hard, Seattle. Also as someone who got addicted themselves. I think I was 16 or 17 the first time I saw someone smoke Oxycontin off of foil at a party. So roughly 2005, 2006. And it seems like from that moment on, it would be intertwined into every corner of my social circle. By 2008, my best friend was already dealing with a full-blown heroin addiction that started after he broke his leg two years earlier. it would be intertwined into every corner of my social circle. By 2008, my best friend was already dealing with a full-blown heroin addiction that started after he broke his leg two years earlier. Want to guess what they prescribed him while he recovered

and went through physical therapy? Yep, 80 milligram OxyContin pills. Within the next three years, I had 17 of my friends die from opioid overdoses and drug deals gone wrong surrounding opioid sales. Holy shit. In 2011, I moved to the Bay Area to move in with my sister and to escape what had become a city full of painful memories and loss. From 2011 till now, I've gotten

news that another 22 people who were either close friends or at least people I had great memories with over the years, dying. Most of the recent ones being deaths from fentanyl-laced pressed Xanax pills. About two years ago, I aggravated an old injury, and at the time, I was still working in the kitchen, or in a kitchen. I knew that missed work would not be looked at with sympathy, and after a lot of consideration, I went to the doctor. He prescribed me 90, 30 milligram oxycodone pills,

roughly a three-month supply, so I could get to work. I was so afraid of getting fired, so worried about missing rent payments, that I ignored the little voice in my head telling me to be careful. In only 60 days, I had blown through the prescription, was now going into full-blown withdrawals whenever I was without. I couldn't miss work, so I reached out to a friend down here who has access to drugs, bought a bunch of oxycodone from him. However, these were fake,

made with fentanyl. One thing that isn't widely known about fentanyl is that the effect that it has on tolerance and how your body stores it. It drives your tolerance up to impossibly high levels incredibly fast. I slowly transitioned from pills to smoking fentanyl off of foil. Started with small amounts. However, soon I was going through two grams of fentanyl a day. What the fuck?

But back to how it's stored in your body. This is why fentanyl is so much harder to quit than other opiates. Heroin, codeine, all of its cousins store in your body in a way that generally takes five to eight days to clear completely. They are water soluble, soluble. Fentanyl is different. cousins store in your body in a way that generally takes five to eight days to clear completely. They are water soluble.

Soluble. Fentanyl is different. It stores in your fat cells. That means that withdrawals can last weeks instead of days and that transitioning to suboxone becomes dangerous because you can go into something called precipitated withdrawals. Look it up. They're scary and awful. I knew I had to quit. Signed up for a telehealth service that prescribed suboxone and as expected went into precipitated withdrawals during during the transition, ended up in the ER. By a stroke of luck, I ended up in a hospital with one of the most comprehensive opioid recovery clinics in the country called the Bridge Clinic. If any listeners are in the Bay and need help with an opioid issue, please reach out to them. They're at Highland Hospital in Oakland.

They're at Highland Hospital in Oakland. They talked to me while I was being treated, got my contact info, reached out to me the next day to check on me. I came back in. They gave me a shot called Sublocade. I'm not sure if I'm pronouncing that right. It's S-U-B-L-O-C-A-D-E.

It's brinephrine that is in gel form that they inject under the skin. Hardens into a pellet, slowly releases medicine over the month. Wow. Normally costs $1,000 per injection. However, this clinic can usually find a way to get the state to cover the treatment. I had my last injection five months ago. All of them were free. They work with me on my schedule. I experienced almost no withdrawal symptoms have been completely clean from opioids since that's

fucking incredible. Hail Nimrod. Uh, I can say without question that sublocate and the doctors at the clinic, uh, I can say without question that sublocate and the doctors at the clinic, I can say without question that sublocate and the doctors at that clinic gave me a second chance at life that day. My point in writing this is to say what I think you were also trying to communicate. I'm a normal guy from an upper middle class family who went to college, who had hobbies and strong ties to family, friends, and my community. I knew the risks and thought that was enough to protect me. This can happen to anyone. That's why it's so scary and so important to know the facts about what you're taking and when it's time to stop. But more than anything, there's help out there. And if you want to quit, there are a lot of

resources to help. You just have to know where to look. Not sorry for the length. Your mush mouth needs practice and condition anyway. True. Please keep my name private as I did handle this on my own and none of my family nor friends are aware that I ever had opioid issues. Thanks for all that you do. Never stop being you and keep on sucking. Wow. So much information. So glad you are still with us after all of that. And so sorry for your many losses. Holy fucking shit. Love the message of if you need help, you can get it. It's beautiful. Love that all that didn't break you. You're a strong motherfucker. Nimrod is so pleased. And yeah, thanks for sharing the information about new kinds of treatment available.

Yay, treatment advances. Keep it going. More advances. And now let's end on some nonsense. Let's end on some dolphin fuckery. This made me laugh so hard. Sea mammal power bottom. Micah Perrin writes,

Dan, big fan. Just listened to the dolphin point suck and thought I'd write it with my story. I was a competitive swimmer and avid scuba diver at a young age while growing up in Florida. I was 13 or 14. My family and I went on a diving vacation to Key Largo. At the time, there was a swim with the dolphins attraction that was held in a canal at the west end of the island.

There were about eight people in our group, me being the only young person. We all got in the water and were dragged from one end of the canal to the other several times by the dolphins. They were bigger than I'd ever expected. After that, we were able to have free swim for about 20 minutes. All of the adults proceeded to tread water at the surface while slapping the water to attempt to gain the dolphins' attention. I had goggles and I started to dive and swim around, diving to the bottom and then back up. This action really got the dolphins' attention.

There were four females and one male. The female dolphins started rolling under me while I was at the surface. They lifted me out of the water as they rolled just beneath me. I think it must have looked like someone crowd surfing. Then the male took me. He grabbed me in his mouth and swam me to the far end of the canal. Teeth were small but sharp and he scratched me slightly. He then proceeded to try and have sex with me. Remember when you mentioned that the dolphin was interested in the back of Margaret Howe's knee? I believe that is the general location of a female dolphin's vagina, around where their body bends. And that correlates to that part of the human leg.

The male dolphin would swim by, fully erect, and try to penetrate the back of my leg. Remember, I'm a young kid. I was a little scared at this point, even though I was completely comfortable in the water. I started to swim to the dive platform to try and get out of the water, but the male would not let me escape. He would swim beneath me and the platform and either knock me back or grab me in his mouth again. The attraction staff realized what was happening and finally lured him away with some fish. I escaped. I was okay except for a few scratches on my abdomen and wasn't really that upset about the occurrence. It was funny afterwards and my mom has a photo of the sexual assault.

It was a little humbling to be played with by an 800-pound aquatic mammal like an inflatable fuck doll. There's also a King of the Hill episode called Return to La Grunta where Hank Hill is also molested by a male dolphin. They are horny bastards. Happy Thanksgiving. Keep on sucking. Micah. Holy shit, Micah. That story made me laugh so fucking hard.

Ah, what an insane childhood experience. Such horny dolphins. I, uh, I would imagine my son Kyle is about the same age. I was just imagining taking him to a dolphin experience and just being like, dude, I think something's going on down there. I think that, that guy dolphin is, uh, doing something to him. Be careful out there in the water, everyone. Flipper really wants to fuck you.

Uh, now let's get out of here. Next time, suckers. I needed that. We all did. Thanks again for listening to another Bad Magic Productions podcast, Meat Sacks. Don't try and join the Hells Angels this week. They probably won't like this episode. Look up the Cleveland Steamers, MC.

Toots Martinez, he sounds like a really nice guy. And he'll probably let you keep on sucking. Bad Magic Productions Whew. Alright, time to get back into research. I need a little help. Hunter S. Thompson would be proud.