On January 8th, 2011 at the Vintage Motorcycle Enthusiasts’ annual holiday banquet, our PNWMoM raffle bike was won by VME member Donn Harvey of Preston, Washington. Donn won the 1970 Yamaha L5T as a result of purchasing the winning ticket at the PNWMoM booth during the Progressive Insurance International Motorcycle Show at the Qwest Center in Seattle last December.

Donn has been interested in motorcycles his whole life and remembers wanting to have one of his own at a very young age. This may have been because he grew up in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, near the Harley-Davidson plant.

His interest in motorcycling grew and he planned to buy one with his paper route money as a young boy. Finally, when he was 12 years old, he had enough cash to purchase a 1965 Sears Allstate 160cc for $80. It leaked oil and he had to push the bike home.

There was an abandoned NIKE missile site that the neighborhood kids would use to ride their motorcycles in and part of the thrill was that the police would come by and chase them out of there. Donn even learned how to jump the Allstate, which ended up breaking all of the spokes eventually, leading to the mothballing of it.

The next bike was a 1969 Yamaha Twin that he bought with money he earned working at a local gas station back in the days when people would wash your windshield and check your oil. He took his driver’s test on the Yamaha and got his license. He paid $200 for the thing, which worked out to be a dollar a cc.

When he got out of high school he bought a new 850 Norton Commando for $1,200. His girlfriend at the time also had a motorcycle and loaned him part of the money to buy it.

In 1985 Donn and his wife Debbie moved to Seattle. With three kids their attention went to parenting and the Norton was given to his best friend when he turned forty years old. It was in 2007 that Donn got a bike again, a 1973 Norton Commando that he picked up in California.

Donn and his wife have been married 31 years. Last year they rode in the Bonehead Enduro and Debbie picked up a trophy as the youngest female rider on a DR 200. Last summer she bought a brand-new BMW G650X for herself following the annual Sasquatch Dual Sport Tour.

Every year they host the Norton Owner’s Christmas Party at their home near the top of Mitchell Hill in Preston, Wash. Donn plans to take the L5T Yamaha out and have it ready for this year’s Bonehead Enduro, which is on May 15, 2011, in Snoqualmie, Washington.

Congratulations to Donn and thanks to the VME and everyone who supported the Pacific Northwest Museum of Motorcycling through participating in the always exciting bike raffle.