A travel companion, Smith Johnson, negotiating the dry landscape of Utah.
Negotiating dried mud would be a low point in the road conditions during Laing’s 1915 adventure, which he described in his written account as “a six-weeks perambulation on two wheels.” His motorcycle was an air-cooled, four-stroke, 11-horsepower, 988cc V-twin-engined steed with a top speed of about 65 mph. He named her Barking Betsy, and he would test her to the full.
Laing’s journey west took him through 12 states. He insisted on giving cities a wide berth, for which he apologized: “It is not that I love them less but rather that I love the country more.” What Laing called “the joy of the road” he believed was not found in the major centers, but on secondary roads, small towns and in nature. Laing called himself a “motorcycle-naturalist.” When he switched off his engine after crossing into Pennsylvania, “there were meadowlarks in the field piping jubilantly and two or three vesper sparrows that even now at noontide were singing as though in competition.” Laing was a gypsy gentleman. But he was also a pioneer of motorcycle travel, choosing to camp whenever possible. “The first meal in camp,” he quipped, “or the first on a gipsying (sic) expedition is doubly pleasing.” He believed getting out into nature on two wheels was good for the constitution: “It is a good thing for a man’s soul to feel tha...