Tag: Bill’s Old Bike Barn

Billville and the Collections

People collect for different reasons.  Some are completists…they collect to own every variation of an item ever made.  Others have a theme…something guides their collecting and they can’t rest until they have acquired items that show all aspects of that theme.  Still others are brand loyalists…they want everything associated with a particular marque.  Others collect to rekindle memories…items in their collections bring back better times.  And people collect different things.  All kinds of things.

As I surveyed the expansive and overwhelming contents of Bill’s Old Bike Barn, I wondered:  What made Bill tick?  What fueled his desire to collect?  I asked the question and Bill answered it, but I’ll wait until the end of this blog to share the answer.  Hold that thought and we’ll return to it.

When I knew we were going to Pennsylvania and my wife Susie Googled motorcycle museums…well, silly me.  I thought we would find a motorcycle museum if I was lucky and it might make a worthy topic for a blog or two.  Maybe an article in a motorcycle magazine.  Susie gets the credit for finding Bill’s Old Bike Barn.  I didn’t realize we had hit the Mother Lode.  We had stumbled into a more advanced collection than we had ever seen.

No, wait:  I need to restate that.  It would be unfair to call what I found in Bill’s Old Bike Barn a collection.   I realized when assembling this story that what Bill created is not a mere collection.  It is, instead, a collection of collections.   Bill’s Old Bike Barn might have started as a motorcycle collection, but it goes beyond that.

Way beyond.

Anybody can collect and display motorcycles.  Well, not anybody, but you get the point.  In the course of curating a collection, advanced collectors, the guys who go exponential and become collectors of collections, amass collections of all kinds of things.  Then the question becomes:  How do you display your collections?  What’s the right format?

Bill had the answer to that, too.

Billville.

Hey, if your name is Bill, and you have a collection of collections, why not start your own town, and display each collection in different stores and businesses and government offices, all in a magical place called Billville.  You see, if you have your own town, you will also have streets on which these shops are located.  And you can park different cool motorcycles on the streets in front of the shops.  The Billville concept solves several challenges simultaneously.  The streets let you display the motorcycles and the shops.  People see the shops and what’s in them and they want to add to the collection, so they bring in and contribute more things you can exhibit.  The shops grow and the town of Billville thrives.  Sense a pattern here?

Bill, at home on the streets of Billville.
One of many streets in Billville. The streets in Billville are lined with something even better than gold: Vintage motorcycles and Bill’s collection of collections.  Bill’s collections are hypnotic in their appeal.

Being a world-renown blogger and motojournalist, I had the grand tour of Billville, led by Bill himself.  Bill led, I followed, and my jaw dropped with each turn and every stop in Billville.  Billville.  I get it.  It’s brilliant.

The Billville camera shop. Nothing is for sale, much is on display, and the inventory exceeds 6,000 pieces.

We started in front of the Billville camera shop.  I had my Nikon D810 along for the shots you see here.  I’ve been a photography enthusiast all my life. I asked Bill if he was into photography, too, when he mentioned the camera shop.  “Nah, I just had a few cameras on display.  Folks see that and they come back a week later with a bag of old cameras.  There’s more than 6,000 cameras in the collection now.”

There’s a very cool Norton parked in front of the Billville Camera Shop. The bike behind it is a Velocette. Per capita motorcycle ownership in Billville is off the charts.  Billville is huge, the streets are long, the shops are amazing, and the collections are dreamlike.  Pick a collectible item, and there’s a Billville shop housing a collection for it.  Into Coca-Cola memorabilia?

An Aermacchi Harley and Harley’s attempt to penetrate the scooter market, the Topper, parked in front of the Billville Coca-Cola shop.

You can’t have a town without a police department, and police paraphernalia are collectible.  Billville has its own PD, with a police stuff collection.

The Billville PD and its neighbor…a shop with walls constructed entirely of collectible beer cans.
Every police officer who wanders through the Billville PD probably leaves a department patch.
The Billville PD has, as you might imagine, its own contingent of motor officers.

Bill told a funny story about visiting firemen.  After seeing the collections, they asked Bill if Billville had a fire department.  When they asked the question, Billville did not.  So the visiting fireman  offered to donate their vintage fire engine if Bill would build the Billville Fire Department around it.

A vintage Mack fire engine. A local fire department donated it.

“Then I had to make a fire bike,” Bill said.  After all, this is a motorcycle museum.

Bill and his personally-crafted fire bike. This is cool stuff.

Bicycles?  You bet.  Billville has an interesting collection.  Check out the badging  on the one shown in these photos.

Want to guess who made this bicycle?
Check out the chainring. HD. Cool.
Harley-Davidson. I had never seen one of these before visiting Bill’s Old Bike Barn.
My Nikon was earning its keep during my visit to Bill’s Old Bike Barn. If you make the trip, don’t forget your camera.

Some people collect toys.  Bill is one of them.  What would a town be without a toy store?

Another place to display one of Bill’s collections. That’s a cool two-stroke Harley parked on the street in front of it.

Billville has a post office and a restaurant.  Take a look at the ornamental wrought iron surrounding the restaurant.  Bill told me he purchased huge quantities of wrought iron when he was buying up motorcycle dealer inventories in Europe.

The Billville post office is on the left; the restaurant is on the right.
A vintage bike in front of the finest dining in Billville.

Are you into Avon collectables?  Billville has you covered there, too.

A 1970s Harley two-stroke and a vintage CL Honda Scrambler. Bill’s collections are extensive and varied.

There are several spiral cases throughout Billville.  I thought they were purely decorative.  But there seemed to be more to see upstairs, so I climbed one.  My reward was more collections.  How about phones?  Yep, those, too.

Some of the phones in the Bill’s Old Bike Barn phone collection…
…and more phones.

Bill told me again about people bringing things to him.   Matchbox cars?  Why not?

Matchbox cars line a wall. There’s something for everyone here. Dads, moms, and kids.

Into horse collectibles?  You bet.

Horsepower. Lots of it.

As you might guess, there was an area for Elvisabilia (or should that be Presleyana?).

The King.

If you were wondering, Billville has a dentist’s office, too, complete with vintage dentistry equipment.

Vintage dental stuff. The photo ops in Bill’s Old Bike Barn were endless.

And, of course, Billville includes the motorcycles, motorcycle engines, and everything-associated-with-motorcycles collection.  Bill’s collection doesn’t stick to only one marque.  You’ll see Harley, Indian, Moto Guzzi, Triumph, Norton, Velocette, Honda, Yamaha, Zündapp, Peugeot, and many, many more motorcycles.

An airbrush painting on one of Bill’s trailers. Check out the vintage Harley and sidecar.
Now, check out the actual vintage Harley and sidecar.
A vintage Knucklehead in the main hall. Note the spiral staircases on the right. There’s more up there, folks. Lots more.
Vintage Indians. Some are left unrestored; others are restored to better-than-new condition.

Bill’s collection is eclectic.  The collections themselves are eclectic, and within the collection, the pieces Bill has exhibited vary widely.  He’s not just a Harley guy or an Indian guy.   He likes anything that’s interesting.  You saw the prior blog about Bill’s favorite ride, a Zündapp.  Other bikes pepper his collection, including one I always wanted…an early SL350 Honda twin.  It’s the color I always wanted, too, and it’s in its 100% original, unrestored condition.  I stared at the SL so hard I might have worn away some of its paint.

A stunning and unrestored SL350 Honda.
Ah, the mileage on the SL350 Honda…the motorcycle is over half a century old, and it has but 4,000 miles on the clock. Wow.

So, back to that question I posed at the top of this blog:  What makes a collector collect?  Everyone has their reasons, and like I said at the beginning of this blog, I wanted to know Bill’s.  I asked the question.  Bill smiled, lowered his gaze, and answered softly.  “I like to see peoples’ reactions when they see the collections,” he said.  That being the case, I think Bill must have really enjoyed our visit.  We sure did.

A sparkadillo. There’s a lot of folk art in Bill’s Old Bike Barn.

Our first blog on Bill’s Old Bike Barn?  Hey, here it is:

Bill Morris:  The Man.   It’s a great story.

Military motorcycle half-tracks?  You bet!

With 200 motorcycles in his collection, Bill’s personal favorite might surprise you!

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Bill’s Favorite Motorcycle

Another day, another Bill’s Old Bike Barn story.  Wandering through the collection (I should say collections, but that’s a topic we’ll cover in the next Bill blog), I had to wonder:  With all the absolutely stunning vintage motorcycles in his collection, which is Bill’s favorite?  Which is the one he prefers above all others?

So I asked the question.  I expected to hear something along the bar-and-shield line, as many of the machines in the barn are drop-dead-gorgeous vintage Harleys.  Or maybe an Indian.  You know, the V-twin thing.  ‘Merica, and all that.  Bill served in the US Army and he’s a patriot.  Bill’s favorite motorcycle would most likely be a big V-twin from either Springfield or Milwaukee, I thought.

Nope.  I was wrong.  Think Nuremberg.  As in Germany.

Right about now, you’re probably thinking BMW.  But you’d be wrong, too.  Bill’s personal favorite ride is a 1952 KS601 Zündapp.  Take a look:

Bill and his 600cc KS601 1952 Zündapp.

Bill’s answer to my favorite moto question surprised me, both by his selection and his immediate ease in offering it up.  “It’s my Zündapp,” he said, leading me over to the bike you see in these photos.  “When I bought it, it only had 2,600 kilometers.  It’s in original condition and it is the smoothest motorcycle I’ve ever owned.”

Check out the odometer on Bill’s Zündapp!
A fuel tank that looks like a fuel tank. Bill’s Zündapp is a classy motorcycle.

A Zündapp!

So, who exactly is Zündapp and what’s their story?  Glad you asked.

Zündapp started in 1917 as a bomb company.  That’s right.  Bombs.  Munitions.  Things that solve big problems quickly.  The Zündapp name comes from combining the German words zünder and apparatebau (igniter and apparatus), which are the two things you need for a munition (the detonator and the secondary, or main, explosive).  The detonator gets the explosion started and the secondary explosive does the heavy lifting.  In 1919, after World War I ended, Germany was prohibited from things like making bombs (the Treaty of Versailles and all that).  Zündapp had a choice:  Go out of business or start making something other than bombs.  They went with Door No. 2, and Door No. 2 led to motorcycles.

Zündapp first made two-strokes with engines from another manufacturer; they started making their own two-stroke engines in 1924.  By the 1933 Berlin Motor Show, Zündapp was making four-stroke boxer twins along with their line of two-stroke machines.  The four-strokes were called K models in a nod to their shaft drive (kardan means shaft in German).  Just before World War II, Zündapp introduced the KS600 flathead boxer twin, with shaft drive, a pressed steel frame, and four-speed transmission.  1951 saw the introduction of the KS601 (the model you see in today’s blog).  It featured a tubular steel frame, telescopic front suspension, and Zündapp’s 592cc overhead valve boxer twin engine.  It looks a lot like a BMW motor (I supposed to the Germans, a Harley probably looks a lot like an Indian).

The Zündapp is a very interesting motorcycle.  One of the Zündapp’s more interesting features is its interchangeable front and rear wheels (they were designed to allow easy tire rotation).  When introduced, the KS601 was Germany’s fastest road bike.  The Zündapp KS601 also enjoyed a reputation for excellent reliability.  Zündapp built fewer than a thousand KS601 motorcycles through 1958, and what you see in this blog is one of them.  Production ended in 1958 when Bosch acquired Zündapp.

I could have spent more time examining Bill’s Zündapp.  It has not been restored.  It is 100% original.  It is one year younger than I am.  It’s the first Zündapp KS601 I’ve ever seen.  It exudes a magnificent patina, and it does so elegantly.  I’m going to guess that wherever Bill rides it, he has the only one.  It’s easy to see why it is Bill’s favorite.

Catch up with our earlier Bill’s stories!  Bill Morris is the real deal, and Bill’s Old Bike Barn is one of the most interesting motorcycle museums I’ve ever visited.  We’re doing on a series on the man and the museum; this is our fourth installment.

Miss our first blog on Bill’s Old Bike Barn?  Hey, here it is:

The next blog in this series is on Bill Morris:  The Man.   It’s a great story.

Military motorcycle half-tracks?  You bet!

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Bill’s Old Bike Barn…a first peek

Stop what you’re doing.  Get off the Internet (and for sure, get off Facebook and the other moronic “social media” time wasters).  Start planning a trip to Bloomsburg, Pennsylvania.  You need to see Bill’s Old Bike Barn. The riding is fabulous in rural Pennsylvania and with Bill’s as a destination, the ride is even better. You can thank me now or you can thank me later, but you will thank me.

Any motorcycle museum that includes in its directions “turn where you see the dinosaurs” should grab your attention.  In the case of Bill’s Old Bike Barn, your undivided attention is warranted.  To say I was blown away would be an understatement of immense proportions.  To cut to the chase, I’ve never seen anything like Bill’s, and I know for damn sure I’ve never met a man like Bill.  That’s Bill artistically framed by Milwaukee iron in the photo above, and yeah, I shot that picture.  I’m proud of it.  It hints at the dimensions of the man and what he’s created out there in Pennsylvania.

During our interview I asked Bill his last name and he told me:  Morris, just like the cigarettes.  I didn’t get it until later, and then I couldn’t stop laughing.  If you don’t get it immediately, you will.  Bill has that kind of slingshot wit.  I love the guy and his collection.  You will, too.

Above all else, Bill is two things: A collector, and a people person.  The extent if his collection…well, I can’t describe it.  You need to see it.  You’ll get just a hint here in the ExNotes series of blogs we’re doing.  When you visit the place, you’ll feel like you owe me.  When you meet Bill, you’ll know you’ve made a friend.  A most interesting friend.

Up above, that’s the building that houses Bill’s collection.  You can’t really see it from the highway.  You have to look for the dinosaurs (just like the directions say), turn, and then head uphill.  You’ll go by the bison, some other cool items, and more.  The building looks deceptively small from the outside.  Inside…you could spend weeks and not see all of what’s in there.

You can learn about Bill’s Old Bike Barn on his website, but we’re going to give you more here on ExNotes.  We’re going to do it over the span of several blogs over the next few weeks, and in an upcoming article in a major moto mag.  Ever watched and enjoyed American Pickers?  Trust me on this (and trust me on everything else, for that matter): Bill Morris puts American Pickers to shame.  You and I have never seen anything like what’s in Bill’s Old Bike Barn.

I’m excited about what I’ve seen and what I’m going to be sharing with you.  I’ll do my best to bring it to life in print and in the photos, but it won’t be enough.  You really need to visit Bill’s Old Bike Barn.

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