Page 1 Page 2 Page 3 Page 4 Page 5 Page 6 Page 7 Page 8 Page 9 Page 10 Page 11 Page 12 Page 13 Page 14 Page 15 Page 16 Page 17 Page 18 Page 19 Page 20 Page 21 Page 22 Page 23 Page 24 Page 25 Page 26 Page 27 Page 28 Page 29 Page 30 Page 31 Page 32 Page 33 Page 34 Page 35 Page 36 Page 37 Page 38 Page 39 Page 40 Page 41 Page 42 Page 43 Page 44 Page 45 Page 46 Page 47 Page 48 Page 49 Page 50 Page 51 Page 52 Page 53 Page 54 Page 55 Page 56 Page 57 Page 58 Page 59 Page 60 Page 61 Page 62 Page 63 Page 64 Page 65 Page 66 Page 67 Page 68 Page 69 Page 70 Page 71 Page 72 Page 73 Page 74 Page 75 Page 76 Page 77 Page 78 Page 79 Page 80 Page 81 Page 82 Page 83 Page 84Winter 2014 | IRON BUTT MAGAZINE  It was around noon when he left the summit and headed east along Happy Jack’s Road (WY  today), still following in the tracks left by the presidential party. It began to rain heav- ily, which made the main road impassible, so Wyman diverted to one of the less traveled trails. At some point his motorcycle got hopelessly stuck in what he termed “gumbo” mud. He was forced to leave the bike standing upright, stuck in the mud, as he ventured off to a ranch house a couple of miles away. He met up with the rancher who assembled a team of horses and fol- lowed Wyman back to extract his stuck motorcycle. By the time they got back to the ranch house, it was get- ting late in the afternoon. George cleaned his motorcycle, after- which the rancher offered him something to eat and a bed for the night. Wyman was most grateful but declined to stay the night as he had to push on to Cheyenne. The rancher showed George where the railroad tracks were a couple of miles to the east. Wyman rode the rail bed the  miles or so to Cheyenne, most of it in the rain. By the time he got to Cheyenne at : pm, he was soaked to the bone and his clothes torn and muddy. The barrel of his pistol protruded through a hole in his pocket, but he didn’t realize this until later. Wyman must have looked like a tough hombre when he checked his motorcycle in at the Cheyenne UPRR depot. Three hotels refused him a room as he sought a place to stay for the night. He tried a couple of boarding houses with the same result. Finally, a benevolent lady offered him a cot, but after Wyman told her of his adventures, she offered him a nice room inside; he ended up staying there two nights. By the time George reached Omaha,he was a hardened long- distance motorcyclist. He expected the roads and availability of services to get much better as he rode east, so he removed his tail pack and auxillary gas tank. He sent them, along with the majority of his tools, by rail express ahead to Chicago, Illinois. Unfortunately, George found that the roads were not much better, so he rode the rail beds whenever he could. Just outside of Chicago, the crank shaft on his motor broke. It was the low point of his trip. Even though Wyman was an accomplished mechanic by trade, he recognized that this break- down put the entire ride in jeopardy. As he sat to on the side of the road, a local rider stopped and asked if he needed help. This local rider put Wyman in contact with a local motorcycle repair shop,which gave him the morale boost he needed to push through. He spent a couple of days near Chicago waiting on a new crank shaft to arrive from San Francisco. George was determined to overcome this setback and get back on the road. With two-thirds of the distance under his belt, he was deter- mined to finish. And on July ,  — a little over seven weeks after he left San Francisco — Wyman finally made his dream a reality by riding his motorcycle into New York City. Enriching the Future The highlights of Wyman’s story capture the very spirit of the long-distance motorcycle rider; they reflect the desire to go beyond one’s riding horizons and seek the challenging over the mundane. George’s epic ride is an inspiration to all who would call themselves an Iron Butt rider.The lure of the long ride fuels our passion to make every trip a hard riding adventure. In the  years since Road Rider magazine retold Wyman’s story, our generation has discovered the passion for the long ride. Thanks to the Iron Butt Association, we have a standard under which to ride.The IBA is recognized the worldover as the sanctioning body for all those who would claim the mantle of long-distance rider. We owe George A. Wyman a debt of rec- ognition. If any group of enthusiasts should accept the duty to keep Wyman’s story alive, it is those who live the passion today. Wyman reminds us, by his example, that he was the first World’s Toughest Motorcycle Rider. Tim Masterson, IBA #, has successfully completed over  IBA challenge rides and is a two-time Gold Medal Finisher of the Iron Butt Rally. He is the volunteer manager of the George A. Wyman Memorial Project.  Memorial Project.