Orie Steele

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Orie Steele was a notable motorcycle hillclimb champion in the 1920's and 1930's

His career began in 1913 riding endurance races. He raced for Indian motorcycles. His father John Steele [1] owned an Indian Motocycle dealership in Paterson, N.J. After early success in endurance racing he stopped racing during World War One. at this time he worked with the Army outfitting motorcycles and training men how to ride them. After the wars end he returned to competition and began winning races at an incredible rate.

Inducted into the Motorcycle Hall of Fame [2] in October of 2007 here is a transcript of the induction speech given by his Grandson John Clauss:

It is with great honor that I introduce to you, my grandfather, Orie Steele [3], to the Motorcycle Hall of Fame. His career started in 1913, riding Indians. His entire career was spent riding Indian motorcycles and winning many events. The beginning of his career he spent racing endurance. One notable win of this time period was the 1914 Yonkers endurance run, a 500 mile race with his father, John Steele in the side car. Imagine riding 500 miles on 1914 roads with your father sitting next to you. Endurance is a good word for it, although Hell might be just as good. There was a break in his racing career during the late teens due to his military service, which appropriately involved motorcycles. His return from service saw the boom in his winning ways. His career was spent mostly on the East Coast. Hills in Rochester, Mt. Beacon, and Fond du Lac in Wisconsin, were his most fertile grounds. However in 1923 he made a trip to the West. He ran on California's most prominent hill, Capistrano, against all the locals and the odds and he won. I think the quote from Western Motorcyclist and Bicyclist put it best, ". Steele has an entirely different style of hillclimbing from others, but it is a finished style that commands admiration from all. His performance for his first time on Capistrano was marvelous and raised the enthusiasm of his Indian worshipers to the bursting point." Harry Sucher in his book The Iron Redskin had this to say about my grandfather's style. "His hell-for-leather style was seldom imitated by others, as it required singular courage to perform. Steele would start his engine, rev it full throttle and drop the clutch, at the same time throwing himself well forward over the handlebars." This is pretty much the same style which is used by today's hillclimbers. In the process of gathering information I have found over 100 events in which my grandfather scored a first, second, or third. I have only counted wins in which we have found a paper record of. There are many more 1st places on that list than others. I started my website about my grandfather 10 years ago. The idea at its inception was that it would be a family repository of information about my grandfather. But websites, being public draw attention from others with similar interests. Soon I was receiving e-mails from around the country, and the world. Many people have sent me articles and contributed to the storehouse of information, without their help I do not know if this would have been possible. Information, pictures and a complete listing of Orie Steele's documanted wins, seconds and thirds see [4]

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