Born this date in 1938 was Evel Knievel (Robert Craig Knievel), Motorcycle daredevil Stunt rider. 10 things you might not know about him.
He was born in a small mining town in Montana, Butte, and christened Robert Craig Knievel. His father cheated on his wife, who divorced him when she was pregnant with Evel’s younger brother, Nic. Both parents left town, and the two boys were left with their paternal grandparents Ignatius and Emma Knievel.
Evel got the daredevil stunt riding bug from watching another famous stunt rider of the time, Joie Chitwood, when he was eight years old.
When he left school he got a job as a drill operator at the mine, and then as a driver. He was fired for attempting wheelies in a large digger – the attempt went wrong and he took out the main power line, so the town was without power for several hours.
It was thanks to reckless driving that he first got his nickname. His reckless driving got him arrested and he spent some time in prison. There was another prisoner at the time called William C Knofel. The latter’s name rhymed with “awful” which led one of the guards to quip, “well boys, looks like we better double our guard. We’ve got Evel Knievel and Awful Knofel.”
After being fired from the mine he drifted from job to job, not finding his niche in any of them. One of his endeavours was starting a local hockey team called the Butte Bombers. He borrowed money to set it up and often couldn’t pay the players, but even so managed to set up a match he hoped would draw the crowds: an international game with the Czechoslovakian Olympic hockey team. The Butte Bombers lost the game, but thanks to fundraisers and ticket money there was enough in the pot to pay for the Czech team’s travel and lodging. Until the money and receipts from the game went missing and the US Olympic committee had to foot the bill. That was the end of hockey team management for Evel.
One job he did passably well at was selling motorbikes. To boost sales, he started staging stunts like jumping the bikes over Lions and Rattlesnakes. Encouraged by his local legend status, he started the Evel Knievel and His Motorcycle Daredevils stunt group in 1966, but soon split from them and embarked on a solo career. In 1967 Evel jumped 15 cars on a motorbike on TV.
His famous jumps included the fountain at Caesar’s Palace, Las Vegas. While he cleared the fountain with no problem, he missed the landing ramp and ended up in hospital with several broken bones and in a coma for weeks. That didn’t stop him. Within weeks he was trying to get permission to jump the Grand Canyon. He actually got permission from the Department of the Interior to do it, but only because they thought his request was a joke. As soon as they realised it wasn’t, the permission was withdrawn. Although Evel’s son Robbie would do it in 1999. His longest jump was 133 feet and that also happened to be his only jump in the UK, at Wembley Stadium. He jumped over 14 greyhound Buses. Not, as early publicity using the words “London buses” might have suggested, but single deck coaches.
In 1959 Evel Knievel married Linda Bork and had four children with her. They were married for 38 years, even though he cheated on her while touring and it was no secret that he beat her. Linda was popular in their neighbourhood so he wasn’t the best liked person at home. They divorced in 1997 and Evel married pro golfer Krystal Kennedy who was half his age. He beat her as well. She didn’t put up with it for as long as Linda had and divorced him after two years and got a restraining order. That said, they eventually worked out their differences and remained friends until Evel died.
He held a world record that nobody in their right mind would want to beat – the most bones broken in a lifetime, 433. That record, set in 1975, still stands today. His frequent injuries certainly took their toll. By 2006 he was in constant pain and needed a morphine drip. The accumulative effects of all those injuries contributed to his death at the age of 69, combined with diabetes and alcoholism. He also found it exceedingly difficult to get life insurance, health insurance or car insurance. He once stated at an interview that Lloyd's of London wouldn’t even insure him – he’d been rejected by them 37 times.
A few months before he died, he appeared on TV announcing that he had become a Christian and was baptised at a televised ceremony in California.
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