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Another childhood hero gone.
Legendary motorcycle stuntman Evel Knievel died Friday, according to evelknievel.com. I pretended to be Evel many a time when riding my bike as a kid.
Another childhood hero gone.
Wow.
RIP
R.i.p.
Damn.
Jesus, I thought he was dead already.
Anyone else have one of these?
Noooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!
He was a Spursfan too.
Anyone else have one of these?
I had that, and I had the Van that you could put the ramp on. I think I might have had the Rocket Car too.
He was only 69? I thought he was much older.
Evel doing a jump on Wild World of Sports....then getting on your bike and trying it in the front of your house. Good times...
RIP
Motorcycle daredevil Knievel dies at 69
Rider best known for failed 1974 attempt to jump Idaho canyon
The Associated Press
updated 3:23 p.m. CT, Fri., Nov. 30, 2007
CLEARWATER, Fla. - Evel Knievel, the hard-living motorcycle daredevil whose exploits made him an international icon in the 1970s, died Friday. He was 69.
Knievel death was confirmed by his 21-year-old granddaughter, Krysten Knievel. He had been in failing health for years, suffering from diabetes and idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis, an incurable condition that scarred his lungs. He had undergone a liver transplant in 1999 after nearly dying of hepa is C, likely contracted through a blood transfusion after one of his bone-shattering spills.
His death came just two days after it was announced that he and rapper Kanye West had settled a federal lawsuit over the use of Knievel’s trademarked image in a popular West music video.
Immortalized in the Washington’s Smithsonian Ins ution as “America’s Legendary Daredevil,” Knievel was best known for a failed 1974 attempt to jump an Idaho canyon on a rocket-powered cycle and a spectacular crash at Caesar’s Palace in Las Vegas. He suffered nearly 40 broken bones before he retired in 1980.
For the tall, thin daredevil, the limelight was always comfortable, the gab glib. Always, he welcomed the challenge whether in sports, at work or play. To Knievel, there always were mountains to climb, feats to conquer.
“No king or prince has lived a better life,” he said in a May 2006 interview with The Associated Press. “You’re looking at a guy who’s really done it all. And there are things I wish I had done better, not only for me but for the ones I loved.”
He garbed himself in red, white and blue and had a knack for outrageous yarns: “Made $60 million, spent 61. ...Lost $250,000 at blackjack once. ... Had $3 million in the bank, though.”
Although he dropped off the pop culture radar in the ’80s, Knievel always had fans and enjoyed a resurgence in popularity in recent years. In later years he still made a good living selling his autographs and endorsing products. Thousands came to Butte, Mont., every year as his legend was celebrated during the “Evel Knievel Days” festival.
“They started out watching me bust my ass, and I became part of their lives,” Knievel said. “People wanted to associate with a winner, not a loser. They wanted to associate with someone who kept trying to be a winner.”
He began his daredevil career in 1965 when he formed a troupe called Evel Knievel’s Motorcycle Daredevils, a touring show in which he performed stunts such as riding through fire walls, jumping over live rattlesnakes and mountain lions and being towed at 200 mph behind dragster race cars.
In 1966 he began touring alone, barnstorming the Western states and doing everything from driving the trucks, erecting the ramps and promoting the shows. In the beginning he charged $500 for a jump over two cars parked between ramps.
He steadily increased the length of the jumps until, on New Year’s Day 1968, he was nearly killed when he jumped 151 feet across the fountains in front of Caesar’s Palace. He cleared the fountains but the crash landing put him in the hospital in a coma for a month.
Hi son, Robbie, successfully completed the same jump in April 1989.
In the years after the Caesar’s crash, the fee for Evel’s performances increased to $1 million for his jump over 13 buses at Wembley Stadium in London — the crash landing broke his pelvis — to more than $6 million for the Sept. 8, 1974, attempt to clear the Snake River Canyon in Idaho in a rocket-powered “Skycycle.” The money came from ticket sales, paid sponsors and ABC’s “Wide World of Sports.”
The parachute malfunctioned and deployed after takeoff. Strong winds blew the cycle into the canyon, landing him close to the swirling river below.
On Oct. 25, 1975, he jumped 14 Greyhound buses at Kings Island in Ohio.
Knievel decided to retire after a jump in the winter of 1976 in which he was again seriously injured. He suffered a concussion and broke both arms in an attempt to jump a tank full of live sharks in the Chicago Amphitheater. He continued to do smaller exhibitions around the country with his son, Robbie.
Many of his records have been broken by daredevil motorcyclist Bubba Blackwell.
Knievel also dabbled in movies and TV, starring as himself in “Viva Knievel” and with Lindsey Wagner in an episode of the 1980s TV series “Bionic Woman.” George Hamilton and Sam Elliott each played Knievel in movies about his life.
Evel Knievel toys accounted for more than $300 million in sales for Ideal and other companies in the 1970s and ’80s.
Born Robert Craig Knievel in the copper mining town of Butte on Oct. 17, 1938, Knievel was raised by his grandparents. He traced his career choice back to the time he saw Joey Chitwood’s Auto Daredevil Show at age 8.
Outstanding in track and field, ski jumping and ice hockey at Butte High School, he went on to win the Northern Rocky Mountain Ski Association Class A Men’s ski jumping championship in 1957 and played with the Charlotte Clippers of the Eastern Hockey League in 1959.
He also formed the Butte Bombers semiprofessional hockey team, acting as owner, manager, coach and player.
Knievel also worked in the Montana copper mines, served in the U.S. Army, ran his own hunting guide service, sold insurance and ran Honda motorcycle dealerships. As a motorcycle dealer, he drummed up business by offering $100 off the price of a motorcycle to customers who could beat him at arm wrestling.
At various times and in different interviews, Knievel claimed to have been a swindler, a card thief, a safe cracker, a holdup man.
Robbie Knievel followed in his father’s footsteps as a daredevil, jumping a moving locomotive in a 200-foot, ramp-to-ramp motorcycle stunt on live television in 2000. He also jumped a 200-foot-wide chasm of the Grand Canyon.
Knievel married hometown girlfriend, Linda Joan Bork, in 1959. They separated in the early 1990s. They had four children, Kelly, Robbie, Tracey and Alicia.
Knievel lived with his longtime partner, Krystal Kennedy-Knievel, splitting his time between their Clearwater condo and his Butte hometown. They married in 1999 and divorced a few years later but remained together. Knievel had 10 grandchildren and a great-grandchild.
© 2007 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
URL: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/22045287/
For someone who hates me I sure am on your mind all the time.
R.I.P. Evel. He was one of craziest mofo's I've ever seen.
Greatest asshole of all time.
An American Legend if you ask me.
Vaya con Dios.
R.I.P.
wow, that really sucks.
Seriously?
He rode a motorcycle. Is that all it takes?
Seriously?
He rode a motorcycle. Is that all it takes?
no, apparently, it takes several failed jump attempts and quite a few visits to the hospital
Seriously though, the man had more balls than brains, at least give him that. All balls, no brain that one.
Evil Knievel jumped over the Pearly Gates........
i thought he was dead already too...
What I mean is during my younger days there wasn't a kid around who didn't know who he was and he was THE daredevil and entertained thousands of fans around the world.
I just grew up seeming to always have known about him and while yeah, he pretty much just rode a motorcycle and did stunt jumps but he was cool.
R.I.P.
God Bless
Yes I had one MikeyAnyone else have one of these?
I had that sucker and the Van it was bad ass just like he was. My brother had the white Evil Knievel Bat. It came out after he beat up his manager with one. He was my first true hero and I broke my arm trying to be like him.Anyone else have one of these?
Anyone catch the Jim Rome interview with him about 6 years ago it was classic. Rome said about the rocket jump if you knew you only had a 30% chance of living through that jump why would you do it? Evil said Do you know who the I am? Rome went quite about 10 seconds and said yes I got ya.
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