This is why we call the
Valkyrie the "Dragon",
it just sort of caught on.
Shortly after Craig started his website,
Gale aka (oZ) started
F6Rider Webzine. He was
one of the first ones to sell
killer t-shirts for
the Valkyrie. His art
work was great and he worked hard building the site. It was one of the
only websites that changed on a regular basis. It was a learning site
for Gale. The place where he
worked let him build the site so that he could start building a website
for his company. He kinda blazed the trail for the rest of the
Valkyrie websites to
come. F6Rider is still
up and running and receives over 2 million hits a month. It is still the
premiere site for Valkyrie
information. Of course you knew that.
The next killer
Valkyrie site to come
along was
Bob's F6 Valkyrie Page. This guy really did a bang up job on his
site. He put down information from his experiences riding and working on
the Valkyrie. He had lots of great
information on his site, and still does! He is a great guy too. I know
that he was an inspiration to oZ
and I.
Valkyrie
Clubs
At that time there was only one real club where
us Valkyrie riders
hung out, and that was the GWRRA.
Unfortunately the GWRRA did not take to the
Valkyrie right at
first. We could be members but we were "Booster Members", that didn't
set to well with most of us. A lot of us hung out on their message
boards, but never joined the club. There was one guy who really pushed
for the Valkyries to
be excepted as full members in the GWRRA
and his name was Rich Doell. Through Rich's work the
GWRRA started the
Valkyrie Special
Interest Group, or the
S.I.G. We still did not have full
membership at that time, but we were recognized as a club.
The first
Valkyrie only club
was started by a guy named Jon Proctor. He decided to put together a
website with a message board and chat room just for
Valkyries owners. He
recruited folks to his site from the GWRRA
message board, this was before it was a club. Then one day while
in the chat room the idea of starting a
Valkyrie only club
came up. I was there that day and was not sure if I wanted to be apart
of it or not yet. I kinda hung around to see how it was going to go
before I jumped in. At that time I was not sure if there were much more
than a 100 or so Valkyrie
owners on the web. It wasn't long before the
Valkyrie Owners Association,
or the VOA was
up to 100 members and the things that had concerned me at first had been
resolved. I was VOA member #113 when I
joined. The VOA grew like wild fire and a
lot of really good things came out of that club.
When the
Honda Valkyrie Interstate
came out, a lot of Gold Wingers started selling their Wings and buying
Interstates. I think this may have gotten the
GWRRA attention because soon after the
GWRRA allowed
Valkyrie owners to be full members in the
GWRRA. The damage was done, and most of these folks just joined
the VOA instead.
The VOA had some
problems that almost killed the club, but there was a strong following
and the first National Ride-In was just a month away and after the
ride-in the membership of the VOA was
reinforced. The VOA maintained a web
presence on F6Rider
until they could get their leadership back in order and their own web
server up and running. The VOA Labs were
formed and got the website back in shape. They are now called the
VOAI and their web site is at
www.valkyrie-owners.com
One of the things that grew out of the
VOA was local
Valkyrie clubs. Most
all of them started out as VOA chapters,
but then they broke off on their own. One of the biggest of these groups
is the "Valhalla Six Guns"
in Texas. It is a very active group that has grown to love one another.
There are many more of these groups that you can see on
"ValkyrieRiders Hot Links"
Having a strong web presence on
F6Rider already,
oZ and I kicked around the idea of
starting our own Valkyrie
club. We learned quite a bit about the down falls of other clubs and
decided that we could run a club without the political structure that
seemed to be a hindrance in other clubs. We felt that we could do this
free of charge if we could just sell a few
shirts and patches to
support the website. We both had a passion for the
Valkyrie and figured
that with our html skills, and the love of the
Valkyrie, we could
really put together a great website. The question was, if we build it,
will they come? We told a few other folks what we had planned on doing
and the response was great. I called the then acting vice president of
the VOA (Animal) and told him what we were
going to do, and he said go for it, and sign me up. He is
VRCC# 0006.
At that time the VOA
was still on the F6Rider
server. oZ and I were running the
VOA website and helping out Animal with the
transfer to the new server and building the
VRCC at the same
time. It was a pretty crazy time. A lot of changes have taken place at
the VOAI and things are looking pretty good
over there. They have a great webmaster working hard to get the site in
shape.
When we started the club we were not sure what to
call it. We thought about calling it F6Riders, but we had heard a rumor
that Honda was
going to change the Valkyrie
to a flat 8. Well that would mess up our plans for sure. We sat down and
kicked around a bunch of names and we finally settled on the
"Valkyrie Riders
Cruiser Club". The
VRCC had a nice ring to it. Next we had to come up with a logo. We
decided to go with the Viking Warrior with wings and a sword going
through the middle. oZ put it
together and we called that our logo. Right away folks were asking why
the sword? They felt that was divisive. Hey the sword was no big deal to
us so we got rid of it. Then the next thing we had and got rid of was a
members only board. We decided that we didn't want anyone to think that
anything was going on there that couldn't be said in public. I think
that was a good move too. oZ and I
never felt like we were quite done with the logo.
oZ would change it from time to
time just to see if anything would click with us and the members. Then
one day I was riding with my Bro Brad, and he had on one of
oZ's 1520 shield shirts and I got
to thinking that maybe we could take the logo that we had now and
incorporate it into the shield. oZ
started working on the art and when he showed it to me I knew that was
it. It really looked cool. Once again
oZ nailed it.
We were able to keep with to our vision of having
a free club by the new support of sponsors, Direct Line being our first
sponsor. The club grew faster than we had ever imagined, and the
additional support of the other sponsors really helped us to grow. We
are able to give a discount on Valkyrie parts to our members and it
still doesn't cost them a dime to take advantage of the purchasing power
we now have as a club. At over 22000 (as of 2004) members to date, it
takes a lot of resources to run a club this size. When ever we have
asked for help, the
VRCC members jump right in and give a hand. That is one of the best
things that has come out of building this website. The friends we have
made here will last a life time. How can you put a price on that? Like
the commercial says
"VRCC members, priceless"
It took awhile but Honda has taken notice of the
great fellowship that we have built here, and they seem pleased at the
way we run this club. They invited us to join them in a "Valkyrie
Charity Custom Cruiser Show" as co-sponsors. This was a great event that
helped raise money for the "Ride for
Kids" First prize in both shows is $10,000!
Did oZ and
I ever think this is where we would be right now when we bought our
Valkyries back in
1996? Not even! Did we think we would have over 14000 members in just
over 2 years? Not even! Did we think we would have so many new friends
because of putting up a website like this? Not even! (As of July 2004
we've had over 22,000 join.)
This has been a great ride with more
Valkyrie history in
the making. This is as complete of history of the
Valkyrie, and those who were the forefathers of it's web presence
that I can give you. I hope this will help some of the new folks that
have come to love this bike to see where the roots all started. Who
knows where it will end up, but you know if you are on a
Honda Valkyrie, it's
going to be good.
Written by LaMonster & edited
in 2004 by oZ
This is
the statement on Craig's web site now.
Notice!!
The Valkyries Lair
has officially ceased operations.
Effective 6/20/99
I have not been
able to spend any non-working time on the internet since the end of
March 1999 and it has finally become obvious that commitments to family,
work, clubs, and riding the Dragon do not give me enough time to
properly maintain all of my personal internet projects. I have finally
made the long postponed decision to stop updating The Valkyries'
Lair and remove portions that are consuming a large amount of my
storage space.
I will leave this
reduced version of The Lair up, (at least for a time)
for historical purposes. The Valkyries' Lair (appearing
September 1, 1996) was the first internet site dedicated to the
Honda Valkyrie. As such I felt it provided an important place for
people who were interested in the Valkyrie to get at least some
information 'on demand' rather than having to wait for it to appear
piece meal in the press. However there are now a number of sites
dedicated to the Valkyrie including a Valkyrie Owners Association (which
appears to have undergone some major modifications since I was last on
in March). Several of these sites are providing far more information
than I was able to do and I feel that internet fans of the Dragon are
well provided for.
While sometimes
time consuming The Valkyries' Lair has been a great deal of
fun. The Lair and a growing number of other internet sites
have shown that the internet provides a mass communication device which
gives the people who buy the products as great a voice as the people who
sell them. I am proud of the fact that The Valkyries' Lair has
been non-profit, non-commercial, and never attempted to generate
revenue. The Lair never accepted advertising, gratuities, or
donations and I congratulate all other sites that continue that
tradition.
The Valkyries'
Lair has been a great experience for me and I hope it has been of some
value to other fans of the Dragon.
