# Boozefighters
The **Boozefighters Motorcycle Club** (BFMC) is an American motorcycle club founded in 1946 by William "Wino Willie" Forkner and other World War II veterans in Los Angeles, California, and one of the oldest motorcycle clubs still active.[1](https://boozefighters19.com/pages/history) Although it is not an outlaw club and has never identified as a one-percenter club, it was present at the 1947 [Hollister, California](https://www.edgepedia.org/hollister-california) rally that launched the outlaw biker image in American media, and its founder served as the model for [Lee Marvin](https://www.edgepedia.org/lee-marvin)'s character "Chino" in the 1953 film *The Wild One*.[1](https://boozefighters19.com/pages/history) • [2](https://www.diffordsguide.com/encyclopedia/1201/people/a-drinking-club-with-a-motorcycle-problem)
| Key fact | Detail |
|---|---|
| Founded | 1946, at the All-American Cafe and Bar in Los Angeles, by "Wino" Willie Forkner with three other veterans[1](https://boozefighters19.com/pages/history) • [3](https://objects.lib.uidaho.edu/etd/pdf/Saia_idaho_0089N_10609.pdf) |
| Hollister rally | About 15 members attended the July 4, 1947 event in Hollister, California, among an estimated 4,000 riders in a town of 5,000[4](https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1996-05-02-mn-65134-story.html) |
| Film legacy | *The Wild One* (1953), starring Marlon Brando and Lee Marvin, was inspired by Hollister; Forkner was the model for Marvin's "Chino"[2](https://www.diffordsguide.com/encyclopedia/1201/people/a-drinking-club-with-a-motorcycle-problem) |
| Club status | The club states it has never been a one-percenter or outlaw club and respects the rights of all motorcycle clubs[5](https://www.boozefighters92.com/history/english/) |
| Founder's death | Forkner died in 1997, six days before the inaugural Hollister Independence Rally; his ashes are displayed at Johnny's Bar in Hollister[6](https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2002/08/12/the-gangs-all-here) |
| Anniversary | The club turns 80 in 2026 and remains active with chapters in the United States and abroad[7](https://www.boozefightersride.com/) |
## Origins
Forkner was a World War II veteran who had survived service in the Pacific, including a mission over [Iwo Jima](https://www.edgepedia.org/iwo-jima) in which his regular B-24 bomber crew was lost.[4](https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1996-05-02-mn-65134-story.html) Before the war he had ridden with the 13 Rebels, a loose-knit pre-war motorcycling group that some historians consider an immediate forerunner of the outlaw clubs.[3](https://objects.lib.uidaho.edu/etd/pdf/Saia_idaho_0089N_10609.pdf) After crashing through a fence during a race in [El Cajon, California](https://www.edgepedia.org/el-cajon-california), in 1946, he was expelled from the club, and he went looking for other outcast veterans who found civilian life dull.[5](https://www.boozefighters92.com/history/english/)
The founding itself took place over drinks. According to one club history, Forkner began drinking with three former servicemen at the All-American Bar, and as the night went on the four decided to form a new club but could not agree on a name. A bar regular named Walt Porter called out, "Call it the Boozefighters," and the name stuck.[8](https://api.pageplace.de/preview/DT0400.9781317524113_A23898470/preview-9781317524113_A23898470.pdf) Forkner's co-founder J.D. Cameron, a freight-unloading and trucking businessman who employed Forkner, described the postwar mood plainly: "People were happy the war was over and we just wanted to enjoy life."[4](https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1996-05-02-mn-65134-story.html) The club's own motto plays on its name: "Boozefighters never fight booze, they abuse it."
## Hollister, 1947
On the Fourth of July weekend in 1947, an estimated 4,000 motorcyclists converged on Hollister, a farming town of 5,000 about 40 miles southeast of San Jose, for an American Motorcycle Association-sanctioned event that included city-approved street racing on San Benito Street.[4](https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1996-05-02-mn-65134-story.html) • [9](https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/wild-thing-87717190/) What set that year apart was the arrival of about 15 Boozefighters riding north from Los Angeles.[4](https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1996-05-02-mn-65134-story.html)
The trouble was modest by later standards. A Times report described Boozefighters getting drunk, jumping the curb, and riding into Johnny's Bar on the main drag, with one member arrested for attempting to pour alcohol into a bus radiator; dozens were arrested and several injured.[10](https://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-hollister-marlon-brando-biker-culture-20150519-story.html) Participants remembered it as little more than fistfights and heavy drinking, and property damage was minimal.[9](https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/wild-thing-87717190/) Forkner himself spent time in the town jail on a charge of inciting a riot, which he attributed to a would-be jailbreak after another member was arrested for drunk and disorderly conduct.[4](https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1996-05-02-mn-65134-story.html)
The media made the legend. The [San Francisco Chronicle](https://www.edgepedia.org/san-francisco-chronicle) described the events as "the worst 40 hours in the history of Hollister," and *[Life](https://www.edgepedia.org/life-magazine)* magazine published a staged photograph of a leather-jacketed rider swilling beer on a parked Harley, surrounded by empty bottles.[11](https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2006-feb-27-me-bikers27-story.html) Forkner and Cameron insisted for the rest of their lives that the photograph was staged.[4](https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1996-05-02-mn-65134-story.html) The Boozefighters were never named in the *Life* spread, but word of mouth spread their name through the biking world.[4](https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1996-05-02-mn-65134-story.html) A further ruckus in Riverside the next year, with 46 arrests, added to the club's reputation for wildness.[4](https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1996-05-02-mn-65134-story.html) • [10](https://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-hollister-marlon-brando-biker-culture-20150519-story.html)
## The Wild One and the outlaw image
The Hollister coverage fed a chain of retellings: a 1951 Harper's short story by Frank Rooney, "The Cyclists' Raid," and then the [Columbia Pictures](https://www.edgepedia.org/columbia-pictures) film *The Wild One* (1953), directed by László Benedek and produced by [Stanley Kramer](https://www.edgepedia.org/stanley-kramer), starring [Marlon Brando](https://www.edgepedia.org/marlon-brando) as Johnny and Lee Marvin as Chino, the leader of a rival gang.[12](https://www.tcm.com/articles/25750/the-big-idea-the-wild-one-1953) • [13](https://www.filmsite.org/wildone.html) Forkner served as a production consultant and was the model for Chino, although the film never named the Boozefighters.[2](https://www.diffordsguide.com/encyclopedia/1201/people/a-drinking-club-with-a-motorcycle-problem) • [4](https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1996-05-02-mn-65134-story.html) The film's effect was double-edged: it made bikers into pop-culture icons while branding them a menace to society, to the point that British censors banned the film in the United Kingdom for 14 years.[2](https://www.diffordsguide.com/encyclopedia/1201/people/a-drinking-club-with-a-motorcycle-problem) Cameron's own verdict was blunt: "I hated that movie."[4](https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1996-05-02-mn-65134-story.html)
The Hollister episode also seeded the one-percenter identity of the outlaw biker subculture. After the incident, outlaw bikers were described as "the 1 per cent deviant fringe" of motorcycling, a label they adopted as a badge of honor.[14](https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s12117-017-9322-7) The Boozefighters stand apart from that lineage: the club states that it has never been one-percenters or an outlaw club, and it describes itself as believing in peaceful coexistence with all motorcycle clubs.[5](https://www.boozefighters92.com/history/english/) One academic dissertation credits Forkner's founding of the club as a catalyst in the creation of the first outlaw motorcycle club and the shaping of the outlaw biker myth, a framing the club itself rejects.[3](https://objects.lib.uidaho.edu/etd/pdf/Saia_idaho_0089N_10609.pdf)
## Later history
The club remained active through the 1950s, then quieted; by 1970 the aging original members had scattered across the country, with Cameron running a trucking business and Forkner working as a trucker.[4](https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1996-05-02-mn-65134-story.html) The club later revived and grew into an international organization; by the early 2000s it had chapters in the United States and abroad, including self-anointed members in Norway whose legitimacy the club's national leadership was still working to regularize.[6](https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2002/08/12/the-gangs-all-here) In 2026, the club marks its 80th anniversary with a planned ride of Route 66 from beginning to end.[7](https://www.boozefightersride.com/)
Forkner died in 1997, six days before the inaugural Hollister Independence Rally, and his ashes are displayed inside Johnny's Bar, which the club regards as hallowed ground.[6](https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2002/08/12/the-gangs-all-here) Members describe the club with the self-deprecating phrase "a drinking club with a motorcycle problem," and its chapter histories emphasize the founding priorities of family, job, and club.[15](https://bfmc44.com/index.html?m=) Bill Hayes, author of *The Original Wild Ones*, a history of the club, has helped preserve the Hollister story from the members' side, recounting how the media turned a bail-out visit into a "would-be jailbreak."[11](https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2006-feb-27-me-bikers27-story.html)
## References
1. [History, Boozefighters MC Chapter 19](https://boozefighters19.com/pages/history)
2. [Boozefighters Drinking Club History And Wino Willie, Difford's Guide](https://www.diffordsguide.com/encyclopedia/1201/people/a-drinking-club-with-a-motorcycle-problem)
3. [The Evolution and Influence of Outlaw Motorcycle Clubs in the American West (thesis, University of Idaho)](https://objects.lib.uidaho.edu/etd/pdf/Saia_idaho_0089N_10609.pdf)
4. [The Day That Kicked Bikers' Wild Image Into High Gear, Los Angeles Times (May 2, 1996)](https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1996-05-02-mn-65134-story.html)
5. [English history page, Boozefighters MC Chapter 92, Italy](https://www.boozefighters92.com/history/english/)
6. [The Gang's All Here, The New Yorker (August 12, 2002)](https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2002/08/12/the-gangs-all-here)
7. [Boozefighters Ride (80th anniversary Route 66 ride)](https://www.boozefightersride.com/)
8. [Motorcycle Clubs (book preview, naming of the club by Walt Porter)](https://api.pageplace.de/preview/DT0400.9781317524113_A23898470/preview-9781317524113_A23898470.pdf)
9. [Wild Thing, Smithsonian Magazine (2003)](https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/wild-thing-87717190/)
10. [How the outlaw biker gang culture got its start in a small California town, Los Angeles Times (2015)](https://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-hollister-marlon-brando-biker-culture-20150519-story.html)
11. [Hollister Kicks Its Annual Biker Rally to the Curb, Los Angeles Times (2006)](https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2006-feb-27-me-bikers27-story.html)
12. [The Big Idea: The Wild One (1953), Turner Classic Movies](https://www.tcm.com/articles/25750/the-big-idea-the-wild-one-1953)
13. [The Wild One (1953), Filmsite.org](https://www.filmsite.org/wildone.html)
14. [Preventing organised crime originating from outlaw motorcycle clubs, Trends in Organized Crime (2017)](https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s12117-017-9322-7)
15. [Chapter 44, Boozefighters MC](https://bfmc44.com/index.html?m=)
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*Topic: Encyclopedia › Technology and the built world › Transport and spaceflight › Road transport › Motorcycles › Motorcycle culture and riding*
*Initially written Sep 17, 2026 · Reviewed: Sep 30, 2026; Oct 15, 2026 · Edited: Sep 30, 2026; Oct 15, 2026 · Last review: Oct 15, 2026*
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License: Edgepedia Community License 1.0, https://www.edgepedia.org/edgepedia/license