Dale Baker was a long-haul trucker. In 1978, he decided to change his daily rider into something a little more radical. He goosenecked the frame and put the sporty tank back on it. But it still didn’t look right, so he had Al Osting fab the tank, rear seat, and fender. It was then taken to Jerry Czerwinski for a coat of gold paint. As they sat around the bike smokin’ joints, they decided the gold was just too much. So Jerry suggested a few orange highlights here and there to break it up. Before it was all said and done just about every color in the rainbow found its way on. Now all it needed was a mural painting. Hanging on the shop wall was a Frank Frazetta print. Through the purple haze, it was decided that print was perfect for the bike. Anderson stepped in and recreated the graphic on the tank. Czerwinski happened to be doing a Firebird’s hood with gold and silver leaf, so that found its way on as well. Jerry is still alive and said there is just no way in hell he could paint something that elaborate today, but the Shaker was his proudest piece. He mentioned that he had over 200 hours into this paintjob. Although you wouldn’t know it, I was told Dale Baker wasn’t into show bikes, he was into bikes that were ridden. He was the oddball in the group because he rode a Harley-Davidson. All of his buddies rode Hondas and constantly gave him shit for riding a Harley.
In 1985, Dale died on the dance floor at a wedding of a heart attack. After his death the bike went to an M/C club called the Road Knights. Its new owner and president of the club passed away shortly after getting the bike. The Shaker again led another funeral procession, and the bike went to the departed’s son. The son abruptly went to jail and is still sitting there today. Unlike the bike.
The motor of the bike was taken out and put into a stock Sporty setup, and the custom chassis was thrown into a pile of hay. A few long years later the incarcerated owner’s family began selling off his stuff, and in walked Al Larsen. Al heard of a sporty for sale, and when he answered the ad he spotted another bike at the side of the barn in a pile of hay and was informed the motor in that stock sporty actually came out of the funky frame. It was at that time Al decided to buy both and put the original bike back together.
Al did what he could to get the Shaker back to its original state. He did a lot of research on this bike and found that it was on the cover of Street Chopper along with a Ron Finch bike in April 1979. Al did get the bike running, but he has a really fucked-up back and fell on hard times, so it was put up for sale.
In the last remaining days of 2009, my pal Bacon and I drove to Michigan to pick up this survivor from Al. With the purchase he gave us the original copy of the 1979 Street Chopper. So it was our goal to put this baby back to its original setup. When we got it, it had some funky shit on it, so we vowed to build it back to its original incarnation. Warren Heir Jr. and some friends drove up to Ron Finch’s to hang out and wade through his parts pile where a set of pullbacks that seem to be an exact match were scored. I picked up a 16-inch spoked rim from Slippery Pete and used a 19-inch mini drum rim that came on a Girder I bought in Indiana. We also changed a few other little things like the carb, and put on a period air cleaner and some footpegs.
With that done, the bike is now just as it appeared in this very magazine some 30-odd years ago. Not bad for a bike that was passed around like a crack pipe. SC