I was hoping that someone could tell me what the crtieria is to be nominated into the STRA Hall of Fame. As a former STRA member, would I be able to nominate someone who has had a huge impact on many STRA members??//

Hi Steve:

While there is no formal, written criteria, the STRA President (presently Ron Milam) typically selects someone with a history of significant, long term and outstanding contributions to the sport and club.
If you email me directly,I can pass the info on to Ron.

Brock
brock.w.sattelmeier@lmco.com

Hi Brock:

Thanks for the reply! I know that my association with the STRA is limited compared to most, but, in my mind there are two indiviuals who deserve to join the Hall of Fame!

I would classify both of these gentlemen in the category of constructor's. You know Brock,as someone who has been in the sport for as long as me that Wick Wicker's tireless effort to the sport and the TDN fundraising is reason enough to bestow this honour in his memory!

Also,another person who has been all but forgotten by many is Chuck West. I could list name after name of people who were touched by his generosity through the late 70's and early 80's. Not the least of which would be the McNeal's. Chuck was and still is one of the true character's that ever graced the pits at any trials event I ever attended. A true southern charisma that I think most people never really got to know how big of a heart he had!

Just some thoughts! I sincerely appreciate you letting address my opinions to you as a bit of an outsider! Thanks!

Cheers, Steve

Steve:

I suspected you had Wick in mind when you posted your first message. I fully support your nomination - he easily qualifies for ANY trials Hall of Fame in my book!

Wick's efforts were appreciated by many in the STRA, North America and around the world for many, many years.

Brock

Hey Brock:

Thanks for the reply! I hope that Ron is reading these posts! I truly think that it would be appropiate to have both Wick and Chuck nominated at the same time. I have been in touch with Chuck over the last year and even recently since Wick's passing! It would be great to see Marilyn attend any inducting of Wick!! Thanks for letting me voice this opinion once again! Cheers to all you guys in the STRA!

Steve

Wick and Marilyn Wicker were inducted in the Hall of Fame about 3 years ago, I believe

Laura B

Good to hear from you Laura. Don't be such a stranger!
I have been following the thread, but have not weighed in yet because I needed to check some facts. I have to admit that the website badly needs to have the hall of fame section updated. I think Dan Brown started the HOF. I don't have a list of past winners. I do know about Curtis Comer, Glenn McNeal, Ronnie Garmon, Charlie Roberts, and the Bussings. I remember the Wickers attending the banquet a few years back, but I am not positive about them being inducted. I have an email in to Dan to see if he knows. I am sure that everybody assumes we have a huge leather bound, gold inlaid volume in which we keep all of the history and goings on. The sad fact is that too much resides in the heads of folks who are getting a little forgetful. As I go along, I am trying to fix that so that when my tenure is over, the next guy (or gal) will come in and know what to do, how to do it, and who to do it with- without six months of on the job training.
As for your nomination, Steve, I appreciate your input, and would appreciate any more nominations as well. Since I have only been in the club 7 years, please include a little something telling who the heck they are and why they are so darned deserving. We should make an effort to induct the deserving members from the past because we are losing the members who still remember them. STRA members should all be aware that they belong to what is quite possibly the premiere trials club in the US ( this hemisphere also). If not, we are at least as good as any other. Our number of members and National level competitors is the highest. The quality of our events, both nationals and club events is superb. We owe a lot of what we have to the early STRA members who started it and kept it going for almost 30 years.

Ron

[This message was edited by Ron Milam on August 28, 2003 at 08:52 AM.]

Ron;
I read with interest your reply, and now realize we are among the elite in the country as far as trials clubs go, with a history to be envied by others.
I would also add that we have far and away THE best web site/bulletin board, bar none. If anyone doubts, just look around at some of the others. Or just check the hit counter. Posts from all around the country-heck, even Canada. I wish to commend our leadership, both past and present THANKS Y'ALL! JEFF

It looks like Laura was correct. The Wickers have been inducted already, along with Nelson Crouch. Basically, this involves the person receiving a plaque and thanks from the club at our annual award banquet. We will try to get the HOF area of the website updated to pay just tribute to these people. Any member past or present can make a nomination, so please contribute. Thanks to Steve Fracy for getting this thread started.

I agree with Jeff's comments. I feel Ron deserves to be in the STRA Hall of Fame for the web site alone!

I've tryed to post again on this thread twice now with quite long winded posts and each time done something wrong and the whole thing was deleted?? I'll try one more time!

Nice to know that both the Wicker's and Nelson Crouch are already inducted into the HOF. Thanks for that update Ron!

The other person that I had mentioned who I thought should be included was Chuck West. For those who don't know him, I'll try my best to give a little background on him as best I can!

Chuck lives in Cookeville TN. From the late 70's until the late 80's he was the sole importer and distributor for Fantic Trials bikes. In their day, Fantic were extremely popular. Chuck's company, called TMI also sponsored a rather large team of Fantic rider's. That team consisted of many STRA members! Some of the more famous ones were Freddy Steele, Mike West, Curt Comer, Dave Pyle and Steve McNeal.

I first met Chuck at my first US National in Austin TX. I was entered in the Sportsman Class on a Montesa 200. I'll never forget the impression that was left on me watching the Team TMI Motorhome drive up with the entire team aboard and all the bikes and equipment! Chuck always believed in doing things bigtime! During the trial the next day I remember after finishing my 2nd loop and riding by the scoreboard to see how I was doing.Much to my surprise, I was leading after the first loop! As I sat there in dis-belief looking at the scores, out of the corner of my eye I saw this large, rather intimidating man approaching me. He reached out to me and said " MR. Fracy, I'd like to shake your hand!" He introduced himself as Chuck West. He said " Your doing a hell of a job out there today! Keep it up!" I had never spoken to him before in my life and I didn't even ride his brand of bike. But, that was the way Chuck was!

We got to know each other a lot better over the next three years at all the Nationals as I slowly climbed the ladder in the Champ class.In 1986, I had decided before the last round in NY that it would be my last. I had been footing the bill entirely to ride and just couldn't keep it up any more. I remember 3 things from that Carl Peter's event. I had a huge crash on the first loop and knocked myself out for a short time, recovered enough to finish 6th in the Champ class that day, and at the end was approached by Chuck to become a part of TeamTMI for the next season. He wanted me to move to Cookeville, work and live with him and ride all the Nationals. Full sponsorship! I couldn't believe it! Needless to say, it wasn't a hard decision to make.

After I had been at TMI for a while, it became apparent how many people Chuck was sponsoring just like me! That same year, he also sposored Bernie Schrieber who was travelling accross the country doing his trials schools. The amount of people that he helped out was staggering to me! His personal project was to always help out young kids in the Highschool class! Mark Manniko from Colorado was one of the many young up an comers who Chuck helped along! He truly was so passionate about the sport! Something I had never experienced from any importer.

Making sure that TMI was always present at STRA events was also a priority during my time there! If Chuck couldn't attend events himself in person, he made all of us rider's complete reports on how we did and what happened so he could keep in touch!

Sadly, with Fantic's many problems and ultimately there demise, Chuck and TMI have been all but forgotten to most of the modern day members! I for one would love to see him recognized for his years of work in the sport and the many, many rider's he helped along the way!

Cheers, Steve

Wow! Steve, I can't tell you how much I appreciate you taking the time to tell this story. I appreciate Brock's comment, but what little most of us have done pales in comparison to this guy. We still have a few more months in the year and there may be other nominations, but it sounds like Chuck would be hard to beat.

Thamks,
Ron

No, thank you Ron for validating my reason's for wanting to see Chuck admitted to the HOF. I have been in contact with Chuck in the last 2yrs after many years. I truly don't think he knows how much he means to a lot of people who he helped over the years and I think this would be a great tribute from the STRA!! Thanks again Ron for letting me contribute in any way I can!

Cheers, Steve

Hi gang,
Sorry to be so tardy to add to this discussion, as I have been travelling a lot on business lately. Anyways, here is the official STRA Hall of Fame; dates of induction correspond to the year of the banquet, which is always in Jan.

2003 Tony & Laura Bussing
2002 Charlie Roberts
2001 Nelson Crouch
2000 Wick & Marylin Wicker
1999 Ronnie Garmon, Curtis Comer, Glenn McNeal

I think Chuck West would be deserving, as are several more people I can think of. And I should add that during my tenure as Prez (which I think Ron has continued), I selected the HOF inductee by informal committee; which means that I discussed my idea with a large number of old hands from the club to try to develop a consensus. Nothing too formalized, but we never had any problem agreeing on a good candidate.

Ron, you're doing a great job, please stay on as Prez for at least one more year.

dan

Thanks Dan for taking the time to list ALL of the inductees to the HOF.I know that all of the people on there are very deserving! As you can see by my posts, I would also be very excited to see Chuck's name on that list! I have no doubt that it would come as quite a surprise to him after all these years! If and when it does happen, I'd love it if someone could let me know! Thanks.

Cheers, Steve

I would also like to say somethings about Chuck West.Not only did he help the National and STRA upper class riders he helped anyone he thought deserved it.Just for puting up with Dean,Art Sanderson and me without comitting mayhem is reason enough to be in the HOF.Also most people don't know he taught a class thru Tennessee Tech called intro to motorcycles 101-103.This is where I was exposed to Trials the first and almost the last time. One of Chucks favorite tricks was to put concrete blocks into a stream and stir the mud so they couldn't be seen."All right you wimps pick up and drain your TL125 and try it again".He would also wet down a red clay hill and stand at the top and laugh his head off as we tried to climb it.Is it any wonder that Team Crash & Burn Trials were dreaded by all. We learned from the master. I am not sure but I think that the two day he put on in Crossville in the early 80's still holds the record for number of riders.He and Art Sanderson also had a prototype monoshock trials bike drawn up a couple of years before the TY250.The Tryals Shop/TMI was the place that the STRA riders of the future were launched and the force behind them was Chuck West. Thanks Andy "fuzz" Turner

Hey Fuzz:

How's it going bud! Great stories dude! Thanks so much for contributing. I originally started this topic hoping that more people other than me ( a honorary Team Crash & Burn member I beleive) would tell some of the many great stories about Chuck over the years! Thanks Fuzz! Now if we can only get Art and Dean to contribute too!

Cheers, Steve

Fuzz,
I remember the Team Crash & Burn Two Day Trials events, I was priveleged to ride them in 87, 88 and 89 if I remember correctly. Greg Thacker & I rode our Reflex Hondas back then. I still have my framed "I survived the team C&B Two Day" photo hanging up. Those photos were taken at the huge log jumble.
I remember Chuck being friendly, always helpful and mostly an encourager of others. I remember a trial on the grounds of T.M.I. in Crossville too. I always thought his Porsche 928 (metalic brown) was very cool. I agree Chuck deserves induction into the HOF.

[This message was edited by Jeff Geisen on September 10, 2003 at 03:05 PM.]

I have a few pics of Chuck Wests riders in action, what e-mail address do i send them to.
Maybe u could post a few on STRA site
Rick Caron

Jeff:

I remember you at the Crossville in 87 on that reflex! I still have my photo from the log jumble too! Hey, that was my trial that I put on at TMI in 1987! Bicycle trial on Sat, motorcycles on Sun. I believe it was called the "Canuck Classic". Ah the memories!