Kansas BTW History

The BTW in Kansas started in 1982 with a two line statement in Easyrider magazine.  Anyone interested in trikes or 3 wheel motorcycles, contact Jim Sickler in Moline, Illinois (and there was an address). After getting hold of Jim and getting the scoop on what it was all about, since a few of us had been riding VW trikes for a few years before seeing the ad, and we'd gone to Sturgis in 1980 as a group and were making 500 mile runs on the weekends, just to have something to do, our group was called "The Good Ole Boys of Wichita, Ks. and Jim's group was called the "Tri-State Trikers", from Moline, Illinois.  In the beginning we had a member in Nebraska called "Bugman" because that was his job.  He was a hired killer in the "Bug" trade.  After much communications with phone calls, letters and running out on the back porch and yelling type messages, we all made arrangements to meet at Novicky's Hideout, a motorcycle campground just out of Bagnell Dam, Missouri.  The boys from Illinois was getting ready for their 4th of July "boys only" run to the Ozarks and on into Arkansas, so we decided to meet and of course Kansas was the first to show up.  My trike was the first one followed by Junkyard Dan, Animal Jack and of course, the one and only Crazy Larry.  After figuring where to put us, the owner, never having trikes before, put us on the front lawn for all the world to see and brother they did.  About a half hour later, we heard the others coming up the road, so under the sign of, "Brothers of the Third Wheel", Animal Jack, Dan and I welcomed Jim and his cohorts, and that was the beginning.