By Jeff Ackerman
The following are a set of short anecdotes (snippets) of my friendship with Smitty (Richard Smith). Enough time has passed that I can now write these without too much pain. I still miss him deeply.
First rally 2000:
The first rally I attended with Smitty was the MOA National in Michigan in 2000. We left Saturday morning and rode up through Wisconsin and across the upper peninsula and dropped down to Midland from the north. I have several snippets related to that trip. We had similar riding styles and interests, so he made a great traveling companion.
We stopped at the EAA (experimental aircraft association) museum in Oshkosh on the way up. It was a neat place, but we found his R1100 RT laying on its side when we finished; the side stand had sunk into the fresh asphalt on the hot July afternoon. My K75 RT must have been light enough to avoid this fate. After removing some gear to make it easier to lift, we had it upright, with no new scratches and were on our way.
I noticed after the second or third time of getting gas that he was consistently getting less fuel for his R1100 RT than I was using in my K75 RT. This surprised me because he had a bigger/heavier bike and loved to twist the throttle.
Smitty turned 67 on the trip up so I offered to buy him a beer or whatever in celebration that night at dinner. He looked at the menu and spied that they had buttermilk. He said that it had been years since he had had buttermilk and he loved buttermilk and wanted a glass so that is what he had for his birthday.
We shared hotel rooms on the way up and I learned that Smitty’s snoring was like a chainsaw operating. However, after finding my earplugs in my jacket in the dark it was fine. One year at the Falling Leaf my tent was between Smitty, and Gene Kautz and I found out he had an equal in the volume department. Again, ear plugs solved the problem.
Smitty always worked hard at the Falling Leaf. Before Larry Floyd gave the Lion’s club a shed to keep our rally supplies in, we kept them in the attic of the Lion’s Den, above their back storage room. I would crawl into the attic and hand stuff down to Smitty. He was going to crawl up the rickety ladder into the attic, but I told him: “You’re good and strong, you take the items as I hand them down from the attic.” So that is how we did it. I was afraid the ladder would break under Smitty’s weight.
For years, the club had an activities points contest where members were awarded points for attending, riding to, hosting, or working at club events. I competed with Smitty for first place many years with Smitty getting first place (typically by only a point or two) more often than me. Being retired really helped him out. One year, as usual, he was in first place, by one point, right before the last ride of the season. It was a beautiful late fall day and I figured he would show up, along with me and we would both get two points for the ride, and he would beat me again by just 1 point. I was surprised when he didn’t show up. My two points from the ride gave me first place by one point. I called him afterwards to see why he hadn’t showed up. He grumbled that when he went to leave for the ride, the battery in his K1200 GT had died and his bike wouldn’t start. I asked him to thank his old battery for letting me win the activities contest for a change rather than come in second. I’m not sure how amused he was.
That K1200 GT was an expensive bike for Smitty to own because he loved the power and twisting the throttle. One year, after the annual ride to Broussard’s in Cape Girardeau on the Saturday of Memorial Day weekend, Smitty decided to blast home on I55. He was clocked doing 105 mph and the patrolman told him after looking at his license: “I would haul your ass straight to jail if you weren’t so old.” As it was, he got off with a hefty fine, he would never say what it cost him. I said: “Smitty, it was Memorial Day weekend, you knew the Highway Patrol would be out in droves, what were you thinking?
When his knees starting to give out, Smitty converted to a trike so he could keep riding. However, this didn’t necessarily slow him down a lot. The picture below shows Smitty in May 2006 with his trike, my R1150 RT, and my friend John and his R80 at the south end of the “Dragon’s Tail”, right before we rode it. I led a group of 6 of us up from the Georgia rally to ride the Dragon. There was a Mini Cooper rally going on at the time and after talking to a number of them, we set off on the Dragon. We followed a red with white racing stripes Mini Cooper S on the Dragon. It set a surprisingly brisk pace; it was like following a roller skate on steroids. Smitty had no problem staying with the group.
Mary and I rode back from the MOA rally in Wisconsin in ’07 with Smitty. He had home set in his new GPS, so we set off first thing in the morning. Apparently, he had it set on “shortest distance” rather than “fastest route” as we were to soon figure out. Later in the morning, after breakfast, he had us driving down an alley, with stop signs every block. I had looked at the map earlier and figured that we should be on the nice 4 lane road that I could see about 100 yds. to our left through a row of trees where traffic was zipping along at 60 mph or so. We stopped for gas shortly thereafter and I told Smitty I could lead the rest of the way home using the route I had mapped out.
At the MOA rally in Johnson City in ’09, Smitty had pulled his camper down into a hollow to have a level area to set it up. Unfortunately, when it was time to leave the grass was all wet and we thought we were going to have to help push the trike and trailer up the hill. Luckily, with the trike, he was able to keep the bike upright as it fishtailed from side to side going up the hill.
Because of his service to the Gateway Riders (he was a president in the past), he was given a lifetime membership around 2006. Unfortunately, age caught up with Smitty a few years ago (he would have turned 89 on July 11, 2022, the Monday after his funeral) and a back operation that didn’t work out left him in a lot of pain. His riding dwindled down and he couldn’t ride after the back operation, so he sold the trike. I would stop by and visit him every few weeks whenever I was across the river, near St. Paul. He always loved to have company and always lamented how he missed riding and his many friends in the Gateway Riders. He always wanted to hear the latest news and happening from the club and its members plus stories from the latest rally I had attended. Towards the end, I always had to call first to see how he was feeling before I stopped by. I could tell by how he said hello whether he was having a good day or in a lot of pain. If he wasn’t feeling too bad, I would stop by, if not I would try a few days later or at least call on the phone.
I called Smitty from the MOA rally this summer once I had my tent set up and had gotten some beer and ice. He wasn’t having one of his better days but was glad I called. I told him that I wished that he was there, having a beer with me like we used to have but understood why he couldn’t. We chatted for about a half hour. Unfortunately, he was gone the next Tuesday but at least I did get a nice conversation with him from the rally. Phil Sulfstede and I were pall bearers at the funeral. He is buried, with his wife, at Jefferson Barracks because of his service in the US Navy.
Lastly, I rode up to Hannibal a few weeks ago on the IL side, crossed over at Hannibal, and stopped in Clarksville for lunch on the way down on the Missouri side. When I came out, I thought for an instant: “I can stop and visit Smitty on the way home, like usual.” Unfortunately, the reality set in right afterwards and I knew it wouldn’t happen again. I miss him so.
By Jeff Ackerman
11/16/2022