Many years ago in a small town far away, a young couple dropped their motorcycle when they hit pea gravel around a curve. Pea gravel was used in winter to make snow-covered roads less slippery for cars, but in the spring, it had the opposite effect for motorcycles.
Bradford escaped relatively unscathed, but Megan suffered a concussion and needed an MRI machine to determine how serious it was. The local hospital in our town didn’t have one, so they did a CT scan and sent her home. A few days later, Megan died of a traumatic brain injury.
That upset the whole local biker community. Brad and Megan were active in our group, often hosting or sponsoring events. They’d book group sites at local parks for weekend camp-outs, organize rides in the Rockies, plan trips to motocross and road races, and once per month, we’d meet at their place for a party and barbecue.
Brad reacted badly. He was totally devastated and went incognito. He wouldn’t answer the phone or even the doorbell. We all felt terrible, in part, because we couldn’t console him. We spent a lot of time talking about it, and then we came up with a plan.
When Brad was due to host his next barbecue, we all showed up at his place with supplies. We didn’t even knock on his door. We just parked our bikes in his driveway, gravitated to the back yard, unrolled a poster-sized photo of Megan, stapled it to his back fence where he could see it from the kitchen window, signed it with condolences one by one, and started cooking and socializing.
After couple of hours, Brad emerged from the house with red eyes and a sheepish grin. We hugged him, fed him, and convinced him to join us in a plan of action.
To our surprise, he’d already started. He took us to his garage where he’d built a pink piggy bank out of papier-mâché the size of a washing machine. He’d secured it to the trailer for his garden tractor, and on the side, he’d written "Megan’s MRI Fund." His plan was to take it to all the town’s public events this summer to collect donations. We were delighted that he’d done more than grieve all this time.
The following month, during the mayor’s annual spring address in the town square, we filled every available space with motorcycles, and publicly requested that funds be set aside for proper imaging equipment. That made the front page of the newspaper, which brought the issue to public attention, but resulted in no promises other than to stop using pea gravel for traction.
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That wasn’t enough for us, so we decided to take further action. We organized a ride for July 4th which involved virtually every biker in the county – from the Harley guys to the dirt riders, and promoted the idea at many county bike club gatherings beforehand.
As a result, almost a hundred motorcycles followed the town's Independence Day parade down Main Street. Bradford pulled his piggy bank like a caboose at the tail of the parade. Many spectators applauded and ran from the sidewalks to place donations in the slot.
We did the same thing on all subsequent holidays. Every summer month, the bikes and the piggy bank paraded down the Main Street to draw attention to the need. The media were advised beforehand and accommodated us with coverage.
On weekends, we’d park the piggy bank in front of local malls and organized special events like a weight lifting contest, a miniature golf tournament, and a chili cook-off to draw more attention. The local media covered these events also. It wasn’t long before everyone in the county knew about our efforts.
Private donations started rolling in and a nearby town offered their Main Street as a staging area for one of our chili cook-offs. We were also invited to set up booths at the local county fair and the annual county horse races.
On a windy Chinook Day ten months after Megan died, dozens of riders followed the town’s Christmas Day parade with the piggy bank trailer in tow. The ride ended at the hospital where Bradford (dressed in a Santa suit) handed a red Santa bag to the hospital administrator waiting in the portico. She passed it to one of her staff.
She’d decided to turn it into a publicity event and invited the local media and politicians. After they’d finished bloviating, Bradford was asked to say a few words. He used the occasion to memorialize Megan and unrolled our signed poster of her for the crowd and the cameras to see. That image was reprinted in newspapers across the entire Northwest.
The administrator took to the mike again and announced with gratitude that we had collected almost 40 percent of the cost of a new MRI machine. We groaned, as it looked like reaching our goal might take several more years.
Then, to our surprise, the local farm equipment dealer commandeered the mike and said, "I’ve been watching the struggle of this bike club for months, so I brought it to the attention of our Board. We’ve decided to match their donation dollar for dollar."
The crowd roared. He received rousing applause. Now we had almost 80 percent of what was needed. Our spirits rose.
A guy wearing a Stetson worked his way to the podium and disclosed that he was the president of the local Cattlemen’s Association. He told the story of a ranch hand who had recently been kicked in the head by a horse and had to be flown over 200 miles by private plane to access an MRI machine.
He then divulged that his organization had agreed to cover the balance needed for the MRI machine. The crowd went wild. We were ecstatic. Our goal had been realized.
Although we'd never been big believers in Christmas miracles, that day, we were convinced.
Header image courtesy of Pexels.com/MART PRODUCTION.
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