Harley-Davidson's 115th Anniversary Celebration

I had more than a handful of people asking for a report back of Harley-Davidson’s 115th Anniversary celebration. Many people were curious as to how the event would be received, whether there would be resentment and unrest due to the current political climate and the recent manufacturing decisions announced by The Motor Co. That simply wasn’t the case. Motorcyclists from all over the world were in attendance to celebrate the brand and didn’t seem to let the recent news dampen their spirits when it came time to party.

The Harley-Davidson Museum was the base of operations for H-D’s 115th’s activities – stacked with plenty of vendors, new model displays, custom bike showcases and more. Not to mention the museum itself which is an absolutely fantastic display of the history of motorcycling regardless of whether you’re a member of the Harley faithful or not. One could spend hours on end taking in all of the artifacts.

The five-day celebration kicked off officially Wednesday evening with an opening ceremony held at Veterans Park near downtown Milwaukee. Davidsons young and old were there to usher in the ceremonies with museum curator Bill Davidson speaking and welcoming his brother Michael, daughter Kara, sister Karen, and mother and father, who hardly need an introduction, Willie G – grandson of Harley-Davidson co-founder William A Davidson, and Willie’s wife, Nancy Davidson.

We were fortunate enough to spend the following morning checking out a “design evaluation vehicle” version of Harley-Davidson’s Livewire electric motorcycle. Design evaluation vehicle mostly means the bike isn’t quite to production, but should be very similar. The Livewire looks similar to the model the Dukester rode in 2014, though Harley insists there are zero parts carried over from the previous model. We also learned during the Livewire presentation that Alta Motors and Harley-Davidson’s relationship will be coming to an end once the current contract runs out this year. H-D was especially particular to mention no Alta-derived or collaborated tech was used on the 2020 Livewire. Expect to see the Harley-Davidson Livewire electric bike rolling out this time next year.

Checking out Harley’s new electric motorcycle was exciting until the moment we learned we couldn’t sit on it or ride it, though Harley-Davidson’s CEO, Matthew Levatich, would be riding the motorcycle in Sunday’s parade. Our asses weren’t worthy, apparently.

After acquiring one of a limited number of FXDRs, we pointed our 19-inch forged aluminum front wheel toward the Pilgrim Road Powertrain Operations facility to go see how the Milwaukee Eight and Sportster engines are made.

The Pilgrim Road facility spans 912,000 square feet resting on a 63-acre campus and was originally built by Briggs and Stratton in 1979. Harley acquired the facility in 1996. Nearly 1,000 employees work at Pilgrim Road and crank out nearly 200,000 Harley-Davidson engines a year. It was interesting to see the automation of the facility. Harley told us there were nearly 1,000 workers, though we only saw a handful as robotic arms were doing most of the work moving, machining, and even measuring engine components.

The Bradford Beach Brawl ended up being the most exciting event I was able to attend the entire weekend. The event was presented by the folks who run New Jersey’s Race of Gentlemen, who brought with them a level of experience in throwing these events that, coupled with H-D’s pull in its hometown, ended up being a fantastic afternoon of racing on the sand. Check out the entire event here.

Of course, all good things must come to an end, and as the festivities wrapped up Sunday with a massive parade, I was just starting a journey of my own, heading south before making the long haul out west onboard Harley’s trickest of tourers, the CVO Limited. Harley-Davidson’s 115th Anniversary was a fantastic event to have been a part of. There’s really nothing like being in the iconic brand’s hometown for an event like this with enthusiasts traveling in from all over the world. You really had to be there.