Birmingham, AL.s Gene Walker

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I finished an article on Birmingham, AL. native Gene Walker for the Birmingham History Center blog. Gene was one of the greats of the early days of motorcycle racing. I also sent a nomination package to the Alabama Sports Hall of Fame to see if we could get him inducted. Got a response back the other day. Bama is all about football, and I'm not holding my breath on this one, but maybe he'll get in. Sure deserves to be there!

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Gene Walker - Daytona Beach 1920

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Forgot the blog link. If you have not already seen it, check out the attached video. Gene's at the very end. And yes, I know the video was not shot at Daytona! Gene's grandson found the blog posting. He had not seen any video of his grandfather. Very cool

http://birminghamhistorycenter.wordp...cing-champion/

[c.o.]

Great stuff David! Gene certainly deserves to be in the Hall of Fame.

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A couple years back I picked up a boardtrack project and Johnny Whisett sent me the Birmingham Fairgrounds Race photo. I started to look into the early race history here in Birmingham and ran across Gene's story. Nobody around here had any information on him, so I started working on it. One of Gene's grandsons ran across my story on the web and got to see the video of his grandfather, which he had never seen. That's very cool! Gene definately deserves to be in the Hall of Fame. Hope we can get him in.

[Tommo]

This may be of interest

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Thanks Tommo. That's a much better copy of the Indian Memorial ad. As you see, Gene's name is given several different ways, which makes tracking his life story outside of racing very difficult! Gene listed his name as John Eugene Walker on his 1917 draft registration. Since it was written and signed by Gene, I believe it is correct. He was commonly referred to as Gene Walker or J. Gene Walker in race results. On the Indian ad, his name is listed as Eugene A. Walker. Not sure where that came from? On the copy of the same style Indian memorial ad I have, Gene's name is listed as Eugene E. Walker. I came across the Birmingham News article on his death indicating he was buried at Elmwood Cemetery here in Birmingham. When I contacted the cemetery, they couldn't find him. They had to do a hand search of the 1924 records, and finally found him buried under J. Eugene Walker. His headstone reads Gene Walker 1893-1924. I still know little about his surviving family and their ties to Birmingham. No other family members are buried in the Walker plot.

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A while back, I spent a couple hours in the Birmingham Public Library archives looking at old newspaper mircofilm. Finally found the Birmingham News article from June 26, 1924 on Gene Walker's death.

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Motorcycle and Bicycle Illustrated article from June 26, 1924 on Gene Walker's death shared from Don Emde's collection. The article has a photo of racer Hammond Springs Memorial in Atlanta on the second page, but doesn't mention why.