Printed From Frost Illustrated 2007-02-07
A biographical narrative of hell-raising, fun-loving black bikers
By M. Francis
In a 1998 interview, genius speculative fiction writing legend, social critic and self-described curmudgeon Harlan Ellison told the A.V. Onion Club, What does it matter if something is old? Charles Dickens said any book you haven’t read is a new book. I’m in total agreement and with that in mind, I’d like to recommend a book you probably missed.
Soul on Bikes: The East Bay Dragons MC and the Black Biker Set by Tobie Gene Levingston with Keith and Kent Zimmerman (published 2003 by MBI Publishing Company) is a fascinating look at black culture during the last half of the 20th century up to today through the eyes of Tobie Gene Levingston, founder of the Oakland, Calif.-based black motorcycle club the East Bay Dragons. That’s right, a motorcycle club and one admittedly cut from the same cloth as the outlaw club Hells Angels. In fact, the forward to the book was written by longtime Hells Angel leader Ralph Sonny Barger.
So, what possibly is the connection between a black Louisana-born son of a sharecropper and a Hells Angel? Plenty when you understand Levingston’s tale as one of the eternal quest for freedom and independence not only for himself but for black folks in general. Soul on Bikes is far more than an exciting tale of fast, powerful Harley- Davidsons and fun-loving beer drinkers and hell raisers. Yes, there’s a fair share of descriptions of wild times in Levingston’s biographical narrative, but the core of the story is the author’s unwavering stance as a free, independent, proud black man in the swirling caldron of American life but for black folks in general. Soul on Bikes is far more than an exciting tale of fast, powerful Harley- Davidsons and fun-loving beer drinkers and hell raisers. Yes, there’s a fair share of descriptions of wild times in Levingston’s biographical narrative, but the core of the story is the authors unwavering stance as a free, independent, proud black man in the swirling caldron of American life.
My father grew everything except flour, pepper and sugar. We home-grew everything on a large garden plot of land called a truck patch. Mr. Charlie Annison, a white guy, owned the farm. Old man Annison let Cleveland grow all the vegetables and greens that he needed. Cabbage, tomatoes, beans, everything my mother could can for the winter.
We raised chickens, hogs and cows, but we didn’t eat too much beef. We ate mostly pork.
According to Levingston, his family probably would have remained in Louisiana where they could live off their own skills if his father had owned the land on which their farm sat. But, like many black families in the 1950s, the family decided to migrate to escape the economic and social oppression of the South. While many black folk from places like Alabama and Mississippi headed for Midwest cities such as Chicago and Detroit, western blacks from places like Texas and Louisiana often headed further west to California. The Levingstons, after much soul searching especially on the part of Father Cleveland, eventually put down new roots in Oakland, where, as Tobie Levingston explains, there was at least a chance for something new:
Some postwar blacks were just as bad off as they were in the South, but at least Oakland offered a fresh start.
Never afraid of hard work, Levingston, then in his 20s, found lucrative work in a foundry. That afforded him and his brothers and a few friends who also worked there the luxury of buying things that would have been hard to purchase back on the farm. One of Tobie Levingston’s first big purchases was a 46 Chevy. For him and others who shared his humble beginnings, an automobile was more than a ride. It represented an additional freedom to explore new lands and, subsequently, new ideas:
Levingston goes on to explain that soon these midnight riders developed into a hard core group of guys who hung together and had each other’s backs. Soon he realized these boys needed an outlet, a brotherhood, a club, something that could keep them busy and out of the jailhouse. Thus was born the East Bay Dragons Car Club a group of fearless young black men seeking freedom. At first they visited the other black car clubs in the East Bay area, attending their dances and other social functions, but youthful rivalries eventually gave birth to a number of escalating incidents that made the Dragons go underground by 1959.
It was Levingston’s older brother Wilton who provided the answer in the form of a fully dressed black Harley-Davidson motorcycle. Wilton initially joined an all-black motorcycle club called the Star Riders while others in the group joined other black bike clubs. Through those associations, the Levingston men and their crew began to learn about club organizations and, out of necessity, how to rebuild and repair their own bikes given the expense of Harleys back in the day.
It was a meeting, however, with Levingston’s old friend Sonny Barger, president of then already well-known Oakland Hells Angels that made the look and the feel of the East Bay Dragons MC far different from the drill team-oriented black motorcycle clubs of the area. It wasn’t just the look of the sleek, custom choppers that impressed Levingston and crew, but also the unwavering camaraderie of the men in the Angels.
The Dragons adapted much of the Angel philosophy for their own needs. First, they rode and to this day still ride only Americanmade Harley-Davidsons. And, after a short lived failed experiment in an early incarnation, the club remains proudly and unapologetically allblack. Levingston, recognizing the unique political situation of black men in this nation, the Dragons have always insisted that all members be gainfully employed.
Again, the book, isn’t just motorcycles. The bikes provided these black men the opportunity to travel and experience firsthand a number of important chapters in American history including the San Francisco hippie movement and the Black Panther movement, with which the Dragons found real kinship. The Dragons didn’t just witness but acted, working at times to clean up the community particularly around schools and black businesses. True to form, Levingston, who at the time of the books publication was still serving as the East Bay Dragons president, also tackles some tough issues that have affected the club over the years including crime and drugs especially crack cocaine. He also is upfront about his dismay over black folks lack of drive in the economic arena. Levingston bemoans the fact that there are no more black-owned Harley- Davidson dealerships in Oakland, for example, because we too often don’t support our own.
Soul on Bikes: The East Bay Dragons MC and the Black Biker Set is a fascinating biography of a fascinating black man and an equally fascinating black movement.
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