To invoke this spirit, you don’t need a table of spiritism. On the other hand, you have to turn a Kawasaki 500 H1 wheel. Nicknamed the “widowmaker” because of an engine that was a little too powerful for the cycle part, the brakes in particular, this motorcycle has the particularity of entering into communication with the biker spirit that permeated the Place de la Bastille in the 1970s, early 1980s with spontaneous but weekly gatherings of several hundred motorcycles. The memory box, on the other hand, was not easy to open.
The first phone calls to the neighborhood motorcycle shops didn’t turn up much. “Ooh, that goes back a long time, the store didn’t exist! “All our old biker customers have gone to the provinces”… White cabbage. It was therefore necessary to call Jean-Marc Belotti to the rescue. The president of the Ile-de-France section of the angry bikers (FFMC) frequented the scene from 1974-1975.
I was 14-15 years old and every Friday evening from 7 p.m. there were gatherings around the Bastille with a wild spare parts market. At the time, there were a lot of boxes so we dismantled damaged motorcycles to resell the parts in good condition. It was really nice, everyone had a drink. Then we went for runs around the Rungis market. And those who were really on the move drove to Cabourg or Honfleur and returned at night.
Frank Margerin, brilliant parent of Lucien and cartoonist in love with bikes, remembers a “fucking atmosphere”. “I had an apartment at the start of rue Saint-Antoine, just at the red light and I heard the motorbikes roar every Friday evening, he recalls. And I used to go there quite often even though I only got my first motorcycle in 1981.” This is what inspired him to write a short story by Lucien entitled “Friday evening at La Bastille” in his first album Vote Rocky.
“It was a place to show off your bike, buy spare parts, eat a fries or a sandwich,” continues the designer. We gathered then we went to have a drink in the bars around, it was very nice. But if these testimonies allow to have an overview of the atmosphere of the time, they do not allow to advance on the origin of the phenomenon. Fortunately, a new call from Jean-Marc Belotti sheds light on the last gray areas. Even if he spent the weekend in meetings to try to thwart the diabolical projects of Anne Hidalgo and to think about solutions to escape the technical control of motorized two-wheelers, the angry biker found contact with François Gomis .
Originally, railwaymen!
The latter is a former pilot and the living memory of the motorcycle world of the 1970s and 1980s. He regales besides with his memories a website bike70.com. For 20 minuteshe returned to the start of the bikers at La Bastoche.
The 1960s were low years for motorcycles, the priority was all cars. But some bikers meet at the Moto club des cheminots sportif de Paris (MCCSP). Their premises were located rue Traversière in an SNCF building between the Gare de Lyon and the Bastille. But at the time the motorbikes made an impossible noise so to avoid disturbing the local residents, they found themselves with 30-40 guys at the Bastille around 8 p.m. to go in a convoy and all of a sudden to the premises. »
However, at the end of the 1960s, Japanese motorcycles, such as the Honda 750 4 pots or later the Kawa 500, arrived, more powerful, cleaner and cheaper. “They are no longer rotten English women who were constantly losing oil”, says François Gomis. A new clientele appears with many young people and as they are bored, they turn around Paris passing through the Bastille. They see other bikers and stop to chat. And this is how a gathering of bikers is born. Our rider-historian went there for the first time at 16 when he bought his first motorcycle, a BSA 250.
The Bastille, district of the proles
Over the years, the number of bikers will grow to group “2,000 motorcycles and 3,000 guys with bikes in 20-25 rows, specifies François Gomis. It is the biker spirit that will generate this gathering. We talk to each other, we make friends, there are no social classes. Such gatherings seem unimaginable today, but at the time the Bastille was very different. It was still a working-class district, “a bit of a dodgy district”, remembers Margerin. “It was the real Paris as we knew it,” sighs Jean-Marc Belotti. Not the Paris of sores. “The rue du Faubourg Saint-Antoine was still occupied by workshops of cabinetmakers and furniture manufacturers gradually transformed into lofts in the 1980s. “I visited huge premises for friends, says the cartoonist. Me, I was starting out in comics and I obviously couldn’t afford them. »
But these gatherings around the fraternity of the throttle also have their dark sides. The uncontrolled spare parts market which gradually took hold was thus used to dispose of stolen equipment. This is also the heart of Frank Margerin’s gag. “It was the great madness of motorcycles, everyone had theirs stolen,” laughs the designer. “It is sure that there was a traffic of stolen parts”, abounds Jean-Marc Belotti. “At first not because the bikers are pure, defends François Gomis. But from 1972-1973, there are thefts and dismantling of motorcycles before resale. One day, I even saw a courier stop, two guys get out and board a Honda 450.
But strangely it is not these shady traffics that will put an end to these gatherings. Anyway, “the cops did not come”, remembers François Gomis. In question, rather, the urban developments of the city of Paris. “In the 1980s, money began to be scarce and the city decided, to bail out, to put paid parking for cars at the place where we gathered”, theorizes the biker. As a result, Friday evenings become depopulated. But it’s not just that. “It was no longer the same generation, the motorcycle spirit has changed”, notes without bitterness François Gomis, who, since breaking his back on a motorcycle, now rides a non-motorized scooter. “All that is over, it’s over,” adds Frank Margerin.
But the Bastille spirit has not completely disappeared. “15 years ago, we said to ourselves: “We are going to start Bastille again”, indicates Jean-Marc Belotti. Every Friday evening, we set up the FFMC truck to provide information and offer a hot drink. There can be up to 150.” Nothing to do, however, with the gatherings of the time when, according to François Gomis, “motorcycling was an extraordinary way of living”.