Name: John Buultjens
Hometown: Dundee, Scotland. Now San Diego, California.
Started riding BMX in: 1982
Number of bikes in the collection: Had 128, now 25
Do you remember the moment that you decided to start collecting BMX memorabilia?
John Buultjens: The date was August 1997. I immigrated to Australia back in June 1995 and left all my old bikes and parts under my parents' house in Dundee. The folks were moving and had everything boxed up from under the house and shipped it to me in Australia. When I opened the boxes, I found all my childhood treasures, 1988 Sport, 1989 Chrome Master Bashguard, 1989 Master Bashguard in black and my 1991 Air-Master. eBay had just come online and I started searching for parts to re-build my bikes and bring them back to they way I rode them back in the day. Took me a few years, but I got all the parts. Whilst searching I was finding other bikes too, so I started collecting the Haro’s I had always dreamed of, including the 1982 Haro Freestyler.
Was Haro always the #1 brand in your head of bikes to collect?
John Buultjens: Sure was, after receiving my OG bikes, I just knew I had to restore them.
Name: Perry Wills
Hometown: Sacramento, CA
Started riding BMX in: Late 70’s
Number of bikes in your collection: 20-25 bikes currently not including parts
Can you claim you bombed down the hills on a bike in the '70s?
Perry Wills: I did not bomb hills in 70’s, we typically made jumps in fields or went to places we knew there were jumps. Relatively flat where I grew up.
Do you think the suspension bikes from the '70s are fascinating?
Perry Wills: Love suspension bikes! Own several. Probably the rarest I’ve had is Harry Leary’s mono shock made by Prodyne.. Current rarest probably the Whitney Marine Baja 500 mono shock.
When you see one at a local swapmeet do you have to get it no matter what?
Perry Wills: I’ve purchased 3 mono shocks all being Matthew’s at a local flea market and one Silverfox shock bike so yeah pretty much. If I were to find one I’d most likely buy it..
What's the story about the full suspension Panda?
Name: Mark McCorkle
Hometown: Beaverton, OR
Started riding BMX in: 1978 in Littleton, CO
Number of bikes in the collection: 14. 11 vintage/old-school.
Do you remember the moment that you decided to start collecting BMX memorabilia?
Mark McCorkle: It was 2008. I still had my original race bike from 1979. I had been hauling around, place to place for nearly 30 years. One day I just sort of realized I didn't feel I'd ever really use it. I figured if I could get $1000 for it, I'd let it go. After digging around on eBay, BMXMuseum and OS-BMX (now BMXSociety) websites, I generally found it was probably a $500-600 bike. So I decided not to part with it.
Name: Daniel Purcell aka Superbikedan
Hometown: Essex, England
Started riding BMX in: 1980
When was the first time you rode at Romford skatepark?
Daniel Purcell: On a skateboard in '78 when it opened then on my first BMX in 1980.
When was the last time?
Daniel Purcell: 2004 when after a lot of pressure from my son and Rom old school to see me ride again I lasted a couple of hours before I broke my leg and that was the end of my come back, many said that was the best few hours they saw, haha.
Obviously you've been involved in BMX for a long time and have seen the bikes come and go. What bike (brand) has always been a favourite to you?
Name: Jonathan Sherwood
Hometown: Durban (South Africa), now living Durham (UK).
Started riding BMX in: Had a BMX from a very young age but only properly discovered BMX in 1992.
Number of BMX bikes in your collection: 35 completes, 14 frames, and a whole lot of random parts and race gear.
Being from South Africa originally, what were popular BMX brands when you started?
Jonathan Sherwood: BMX was huge in SA in the 80's, so all of the major brands from that era were popular (GT, Mongoose, Kuwahara, Hutch, Patterson, etc). In the 90's however there were absolutely no BMX bikes for sale in SA, so you could only get bikes from mail order stores like Dans Comp, ACE, and
Name: Jason Teraoka
Hometown: Kapaa, Hawaii
Started riding BMX in: 1976
Number of bikes in the collection: 7
Do you remember the moment that you decided to start collecting BMX memorabilia?
Jason Teraoka: The seed was definitey planted around 2006 when I pulled a complete 1978 Motomag JAG from a bulk trash pile at the curb. I had that bike stashed for years. It wasn’t until 2015 that I finally gave it a soft restoration and got it into rideable shape and because of that, acquiring parts and collecting sparked. Soon after, a friend gave me two of his childhood bikes (1978 LRV and Team Mongoose) and another bike was pulled from a bulk trash pile (another 1978 Team Mongoose). It was then that the bug fully bit. Collecting went into hyperspace once I moved to California from Hawaii and started going to swaps and shows and meeting some great people in the community here.
At this moment, do you wish you had started collecting earlier?
Jason Teraoka:For sure! I’ve heard so many stories about the glory days from the established collecting
Name: Johan Janssens
Hometown: Boechout, Belgium
Started riding BMX in: 1982 my first season in competition racing.
Website: www.jjrbmx.com (Hutch BMX, JJR BMX, old school Pro Winner and more)
Bike: Quiet Resistant/JJR, Denver Special 24”
What's your earliest memory of BMX?
Johan Janssens: Around 1981 when I saw a kid riding his BMX bike on the other side of the street and wished I had one too. Later I got a Raleigh Ultra Burner.
Name: William LaRoque aka Larock
Hometown: Long Beach, CA
What's your earliest memory of BMX?
Larock: Seeing On Any Sunday for the first time and wanting an MX kit for my hand me down Lime Green StingRay.
Who were some of the BMX riders that you admired back in the day?
Larock: That’s a tough one! I was kind of Partial to the SE Factory Boys because they had such close ties to Long Beach, BUMS track was less than a mile away from where I grew up. Scot, Thomsen & PK of course. But who could deny the Panther, Dain, Utterback, King, Atherton and all of the others that graced the pages of our favorite magazines.
BMX Texas Take Over: Riding into the Lone Star State!
Name: Brian Gutierrez
Hometown: Venice, California born and raised but migrated to Orange County in the late 80's.
Started riding BMX in: Friends of mine I rode with and me started calling it BMX in 1972. Prior to that point we just rode our Sting Rays. We were emulating Evel Knievel whenever possible. Starting with use of a small wooden car ramp we would attempt new records over an ever longer, ever taller stack of old banana boxes. When that lost its sparkle we went to the dirt! At first it was just to find bigger stuff to jump off of or over the top of.
Then we discovered we liked the dirt. The trails that went along with the jumping spots were just as fun
After doing a BMX 'zine for ten years (1987 - 1996) FATBMX made it on the internet. The year was 1998. Here to stay.