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 Evel Knievel: Might As Well Jump
By Cillian Donnelly
Robert Craig Knievel was born in Bute, Montana in 1938. The town was just one step away from an old time frontier outpost, and later the adult Knievel would embellish his childhood biography to include as many rough-and-ready tales as he could. His parents separated when he was still a baby, leaving himself and his brother to be raised by his grandparents. When he was eight years old he was taken to see Joie Chitwood and his daredevil show, and very soon the young Knievel was charging his friends to witness him vault small obstacles on his bike.When he was sixteen he dropped out of high school, getting a job with a local mining company, only to be fired - he claimed - when he shorted the town's power supply after he crashed an earth mover into Bute's main electricity line.
The stories he recounted of this period of his life are to be taken lightly, however, including the tale of how he relieved the visiting Czechoslovakian ice hockey team of their gate receipts, but one story he always maintained as beyond reproach was how he earned his nickname. While spending time in jail in 1956, Knievel found himself sharing a cell with a local criminal, known to the police as 'Awful' Knofel. The young Robert was similarly dubbed 'Evel'.
He began racing motorcycles in the early 1960s, and later owned a bike shop. As publicity for his business, he organised a stunt: to jump over two lions and a crate of rattlesnakes. He made the jump and realised, by the amount of interest he garnered, that a career in stunt riding could be a very real possibility. He put together a team of trick cyclists who performed at various shows around the west, before going solo.
On New Year's Eve 1967, Knievel attempted to jump the 141 feet over the fountains outside Ceasar's Palace in Las Vegas. He crashed badly, spending 29 days in a coma. When he awoke, he was a national hero. Over the next few years, he won huge audiences attempting evermore outlandish stunts. He earned, and lost, a fortune. Under pressure to continually top each performance, Knievel kept dreaming up bigger and more spectacular stunts. When he was refused permission to jump the Grand Canyon, he bought 300 acres of land at Snake River Canyon in Idaho, and announced he would jump the three-quarter mile gorge on a jet powered motorcycle, the Sky Cycle. Almost immediately after take off, in September 1978, the Sky Cycle's parachute was deployed. Detractors suggested this 'accident' was in reality Knievel bottling out of his most dangerous endeavour.
The following year he appeared at Wembley Stadium in London, where he was set to jump thirteen buses. He hit the thirteenth. In 1977, while attempting to jump over a tank of sharks, a cameraman was injured in the resulting crash, irrevocably damaging Knievel's career. A feature film, Viva Knievel!, flopped, and he attacked his biographer Sheldon Saltzman, resulting in a prison spell.
He retired, officially, in 1980. His final years were plagued by ill-health, but he never fully dropped out of the American consciousness (not least through the Lance Murdoch character in the Simpsons), while his son Robbie became a motorcycle stuntman in his own right. But whatever of his achievements, one statistic stands out: according to the Guinness Book of Records, he has broken more bones in his lifetime than anyone else. Don't try this at home, kids.
 Sir Clive Sinclair: Gadget Geek
By Cillian Donnelly
 By all accounts, Clive Sinclair, famous as the inventor of a very silly car indeed, was a precocious child, identifying more readily with adults than his fellow children, and forever tinkering with gadgets and electronic equipment.
He was born on July 30 1940, into a comfortable middle class family, where his father (as was his father before him) an engineer.
His schooling gradually began to take second place to his own academic pursuits. He invented the binary system while working on creating a pocket calculator (sadly, someone else beat him to it), and while studying for his 'A' Levels, he often took time out to work on figures for creating radio circuits.
After completing his final exams in physics, pure and applied mathematics, Sinclair decided not to go to university, fearing that his father's tool business was too financially insecure to support his studies.
Instead, he took a job as an editorial assistant at Practical Wireless magazine, but when the editor became ill and his deputy couldn't take the strain, Clive found himself running the entire operation. He was seventeen.
In 1961, after a spell with a publishing house, he founded Sinclair Radionics, manufacturing and distributing electrical components. In 1962, he marketed the world's first pocket calculator. Later he would do the same for the digital wristwatch and pocket TV.
In 1980, one year after he folded Sinclair Radionics, he launched his version of the computer: the Spectrum ZX80. It proved to be a huge success, and the business expansion caused Sinclair to move operations to the US. The ZX81, and ZX Spectrum followed, both with great success although, to Sinclair's disappointment, they were mainly used for playing games.
By this time he was chairman of the British section of mensa, the high-IQ society. His next move, however, was far from wise. Designed as a new concept in transportation, the C5 was very small, very low and had three wheels. The 'car' was powered by a small engine that ran on rechargeable batteries.
While it is tempting, in retrospect, to see the C5 as some sort of proto eco-friendly vehicle, it was, in reality, impractical and condemned as unsafe. The failure of the C5 forced Sinclair into a period of caution, and financial cutbacks.
He was knighted in 1983. Under his stewardship of mensa, membership rose from 10,000 to 38,000.
Desert Orchid: Galloping Into History
By Cillian Donnelly
 Given the relationship between human beings and animals - naming them, clothing them and often giving them lavish burials and memorials, it's not so surprising to see the occasional quadruped being held in our affections as a cult hero. Desert Orchid is certainly once such animal.
Probably the most dearly-loved of all racehorses, Desert Orchid, or "Dessie" as he came to be known, was born (or foaled, to use the correct term) on April 11 1979, sired by Grey Mirage out of Flower Child. He was bred by James Burridge and trained by David Elsworth at Whitsbury Manor Stables in Wiltshire.
A grey gelding, his early career was inauspicious, however. Indeed, he fell during his first race at Kempton in 1983, where history records it took overlong time for the novice to get to its feet. No longer eligible for novice status, Desert Orchid switched from hurdles to steeplechasing and notched up a few race victories.
Then came the 1986 King George VI Chase at Kempton. The 16/1 starter - ridden for the first time by Simon Sherwood - won by fifteen lengths, and impressed greatly with his stamina and leaping ability, which was considered particularly strong for a steeplechaser.
He continued with more wins and places over the 1986/87 season and in 1988 won the Martell Cup at Aintree, and the Whitbread Gold Cup at Sandown, which was the last race Desert Orchid completed with Sherwood.
The best was yet to come, though. In 1989, he won the Victor Chandler Handicap Chase, beating several fancied rivals and, the same year, after heavy rain and snow had made the course heavy going, he scored a famous victory in the Cheltenham Gold Cup, wining by a length-and-a-half on a course that stretched over three miles in total. Later, the race was voted the best ever by readers of The Racing Post. After receiving three cheers and surrounded by thousands of spectators, Desert Orchid was well and truly established as the fans favourite.
With a new jockey, Richard Dunwoody, he won his third King George VI Chase in 1989, this time as favourite. That season also saw him win the Racing Post Chase, and in 1990, he won the Irish Grand National, and claimed a fourth King George VI Chase victory. A few more races were run, including one final victory at Sundown in February 1991, but in December of that year, Desert Orchid retired from racing.
The one noticeable absence from his long career was the fact that he never ran the Grand National at Aintree. Given his place in the nation's affections Elsworth and the horse's other connections would not risk his death in such a dangerous steeplechase.
After retiring Dessie was far from invisible. He returned every year to Kempton, to lead the parade of runners for the King George, and attended many charity events, where he attracted large crowds of still-affectionate fans.
Sadly, during the course of his long retirement, Dessie grew increasingly frail, and on May 13 2006, died. His ashes were buried at Kempton Park Racecourse.
Tony Wilson: Madchester And Beyond
By Cillian Donnelly
 Tony Wilson, who died recently at the age of 57, was, as the founder of Factory Records, undoubtedly one of great figures in modern British music; a man whose entrepreneurial instincts and great civic pride put Manchester on the international music map and whose restless personality shone as bright as many of the stars he nurtured.
Anthony Howard Wilson was born on February 20, 1950 in Salford, Manchester. After attending the local grammar school, he won a place at Jesus College, Cambridge to study English, where he edited the college newspaper.
After graduating with a Third, he drifted back to Manchester, taking a job as a regional presenter on ITN's Granada network as a news reporter working under the name Anthony H Wilson. After a brief spell with the prestigious World In Action current affairs programme, he began presenting the regional music show So It Goes, which he saw as a way of promoting local talent.
 His show coincided with the rise of punk in the UK, and Wilson was determined for So It Goes to be an outlet for the many new and exciting bands, such as the Buzzcocks and the Sex Pistols, that had so far found television exposure difficult. Then, in 1978, he founded his own record label, Factory Records.
Of the first signings, including The Durutti Column and A Certain Ratio, the most successful, both in terms of critical applause and lasting influence, were Joy Division, whose often bleak, industrial sounds seemed to perfectly blend with the late seventies Manchester landscape.
Tragedy struck, however, when, on the eve of a North American tour in 1980, singer and lyricist Ian Curtis took his own life aged just 23. Many predicted the end of Factory Records, but when the remaining members of Joy Division regrouped as New Order, a new era in Manchester music began to take shape.
Interestingly, around this time, Wilson forged close links with the Brussels music scene, releasing spare Factory tracks on a Brussels-based subsidiary Factory Benelux, and with Brussels band The Names joining the Manchester division.
Back in England, a new American dance influence was beginning to infiltrate the club scene, with New Order leading the way. In 1983, the song Blue Monday became the biggest selling 12-inch single of all time. However, thanks to an expensive Peter Saville-designed record sleeve, each copy lost an estimated five pence on each one sold. It was one of the extravagances that Factory - and Wilson - would routinely be castigated for.
In 1984, Wilson opened the Hacienda club in Manchester, which was instrumental in DJs being accepted in English clubs. The Hacienda quickly became the trendiest nightspot in the city, but for Wilson there was a problem; all the good times were fuelled by ecstasy, the new drug of choice, and not by alcohol. As a result bar profits were low, and the club struggled financially.
Wilson's next major signing to Factory were the Happy Mondays, who with their debut EP coined the term 'Madchester', giving the music scene its epithet. But, despite the highs, problems remained. The Mondays proved difficult to manage, practically bankrupting Factory during a notorious three-month recording session in Barbados and, in 1991, the Hacienda had its licence revoked for six months, amid claims of uncontrolled drug taking on the dance floor. In 1992, Factory Records folded, and five years later, the Hacienda closed for good.
Throughout all this, Wilson remained a figure on regional television and radio. He continued to present Granada Reports, and was the host of The Other Side Of Midnight, a late night discussion programme, and After Dark for Channel Four. He also presented shows on Manchester XFM and BBC Radio Manchester.
2002 saw the release of the film 24 Hour Party People, a brilliant, fact-blurring biopic starring Steve Coogan as Wilson. The highly entertaining film played fast and loose with reality, with Wilson portrayed as pretentious and pompous, something the real life Wilson later complained about, despite appearing in a wry cameo as a television director exasperated by his screen alter ego's unnecessary verbosity while presenting an afternoon game show.
Tony Wilson died on 10 August, 2007 after a short battle with liver cancer.
R Dean Taylor: Token White Bloke
By Cillian Donnelly
 If one were to categorise - or even stereotype - R Dean Taylor, it would be as 'Motown's White Guy', and, indeed, up to a point that's what he was; he was the white Canadian who infiltrated the Detroit label's 'Sound of Young America', before branching out on his own as a singer-songwriter in the 1970s.
Taylor was born in Toronto in 1939 and began performing at an early age, beginning when he was twelve years old by singing in country and western shows. His professional career began in 1961, when he started to get regular work as a session piano player with various local labels. Deciding to try his hand at becoming a recording artist himself, he released the single At The High School Dance, which was a minor Canadian hit, and followed it up with I'll Remember, which again had some relative success.
In 1963, he heard through a friend about a nascent record label called Motown. After securing an audition, Taylor was hired as one of the label's resident songwriters, and was put to work trading ideas with the famous songwriting and production trio of Holland/Dozier/Holland.
As well as playing on several of the team's hit songs, such as Reach Out (I'll Be There) by the Four Tops, Taylor was also keen to launch himself as a Motown artist in his own right. In March 1964 he had recorded the satirical My Ladybug (Stay Away From That Beatle) for the Motown subsidiary VIP, but it was never released, and he continued with his in-house duties.
In November 1965, VIP finally issued his debut single, Let's Go Somewhere, which was co-written by Brian Holland, but it only managed regional success. Taylor's next single, There's A Ghost In My House in 1967 was again a disappointment in the US, but it managed to become a club hit in Europe, and would reach the top spot in the UK in 1970 after several Northern Soul DJs included it in their sets. Gotta See Jane, another song written at this time, would also become a UK hit after doing little business stateside.
The US failure of Ghost In My House once again sent Taylor back into the shadows, where he continued to have success as a writer and producer for other acts such as The Four Tops and The Temptations.
In 1970, he once again tried his hand at recording his own material. He was signed to Motown's Rare Earth subsidiary, which was to provide an outlet for white artists, and his first single for the label, turned out to be a classic.
Indiana Wants Me, a brilliantly catchy slice of bubblegum pop about an on-the run- murderer, topped the chart in Canada and went top 5 in the US. Its success prompted the similarly dark Gotta See Jane to be reissued, where it went top ten in Canada in 1971.
Indiana Wants Me sold more than a million copies, and ensured R Dean Taylor some sort of place in history: he was the first white artist at Motown to hit the million mark.
Sadly, this is where it all peaked. He released a few more catchy pop nuggets for the label, Toas, New Mexico and Shadow, which like their predecessors had undercurrents of darkness but, after Rare Earth was shut down in 1976, his career stalled.
But although he remains to many something of a curio by dint of his Detroit association, his darkness continues to shine on.
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