Michael Holden and Sue McMahon, both former members of the Bernardston Harley Owners Group (HOG) Chapter, had the idea to try and reconnect with two former members of the chapter.

Holden knew that 25 years ago, Steve and Lee Carrol moved out of the area to Blandford. Holden and McMahon found their address, paid them a surprise visit and started to get the hogs back together.

After reconnecting with more former HOGs through Steve and Carol, Holden and 11 others met at the People’s Pint in Greenfield for lunch last month. There, the idea to host a larger reunion was floated, and with the blessing of the group, Holden placed an ad in the Recorder, hoping to reach a few other former members who may be out there. 

“After Aldo’s Harley Davidson closed, our group kind of splintered up. Life has a way of moving us forward and before you know it another 20 years has passed,” the ad read. 

The ad invited members to a reunion on Saturday, Sept. 14 at Smitty’s Pub on Chapman Street, and by noon, Harleys lined the sidewalk of the bar as 20 or-so former HOGs reconnected at their old stomping grounds. 

“Most of these people I haven't seen in 20 years, and so much has happened in those 20 years,” Holden said about seeing his peers again. He said that he doesn’t use Facebook, nor do many of the members.

“When I went online and tried to see what I could find about people, a lot of people had passed away,” Holden said.

The Bernardston HOG chapter began in the mid-1980s out of the old Aldo’s Harley Davidson Branch in Bernardston. At its peak, the chapter had roughly 100 members at any given point, according to Holden.

Throughout the 1980s and 1990s, the Bernardston HOGs would host benefit rides for local charities and organizations. Steve Carrol is one of the original members of the Bernardston HOGs, and he saved several photos, newspaper clippings and memorabilia from that time. 

In 1999, the Bernardston HOG chapter hosted its annual benefit ride for the Greenfield Salvation Army, raising $20,000 for the charity. The year prior, the chapter raised over $2,000 for the Franklin County Medical Center hospice program.

In 1994, the state-wide HOG rally was held in Greenfield for the first time at the Franklin County Fairgrounds. Bernie McGarrah, former Recorder reporter, Greenfield selectman and Bernardston HOG member, helped spearhead the efforts to get the hogs to the fairgrounds.

“The selectman basically approved of what we were trying to do with the fairgrounds, and then the fairgrounds allowed us to have the rally there,” Carroll recalls. “So we made him the grand marshal for the first state rally.” In photos Carroll kept of McGarrah during the 1994 rally and before, he can be seen riding the yellow Vincent model bike on which he travelled across the Northeast.

An accident during a benefit run in the early 2000s led Aldo’s to withdraw its sponsorship of the Bernardston HOG chapter for fear of possible litigation against the dealership in the event of another accident. “Although saddened, I’m pretty sure we all understood,” Holden says, referring to the decision by Aldo’s.

Without a dealership to sponsor them, the Bernardston HOG chapter disbanded, and bikers drove their separate ways. At their reuinion roughly 20 years since disbanding, many of the bikers were reconnecting for the first time — sharing printed photos, recalling memories from the benefit runs — all while donning their leathers, some adorned with the Bernardston HOG chapter patch.

Some recalled the members who’ve passed over the last two decades, like McGarrah, or friends who they’ve lost on the road. Statistically, motorcyclists are at higher risk for injury or death while riding. Yet these motorcycists have kept on, and HOG chapters seek to promote safe riding practices while also providing comradery. 

Recalling his time on the bike and the friends he’s made over the years, Joe Diemand of Wendell said he purchased his first bike, a 1948 Ford Indian Chief, after leaving the military in 1963. He found that it was a comfort to him, as were the HOG chapters he joined in the years following. 

“A simple word for the motorcycles is ‘therapy,’” Diemand said. “Someday when you want to strangle somebody or break something, or whatever else it is, you climb on a bike.”

Diemand worked in Dubai for a time and joined the Dubai HOG chapter while he was there. He says that his international perspective, and his perspective as a local rider within the Bernardston chapter, solidified one thing for him.

“We're family. You see people and you meet people, and the common thread is the motorcycle.”

Erin-Leigh Hoffman can be reached at ehoffman@recorder.com or 413-930-4231.