![]() There, he opened a Honda motorcycle dealership and promoted motocross racing. Wanting a new start away from Butte, Knievel moved his family to Moses Lake, Washington. When the company refused to promote him to vice-president after he had been a few months on the job, he quit. Knievel was successful as an insurance salesman and wanted recognition for his efforts. Knievel credited much of his later success to Stone and his book. Stone suggested that Knievel read Success Through a Positive Mental Attitude, a book that Stone wrote with Napoleon Hill. To help support his family, he switched careers and sold insurance for the Combined Insurance Company of America, working for W. The doctors said he could not race for at least six months. During 1962, Knievel broke his collarbone and shoulder in a motocross accident. Īfter returning home to the west from Washington, D.C., he joined the motocross circuit and had moderate success, but he still could not make enough money to support his family. After his conspicuous trek (he hitchhiked with a 54-inch-wide (1.4-meter) rack of elk antlers and a petition with 3,000 signatures), he presented his case to Representative Arnold Olsen, Senator Mike Mansfield, and Interior Secretary Stewart Udall. Knievel, who was learning about the culling of elk in Yellowstone, decided to hitchhike from Butte to Washington, D.C., in December 1961 to raise awareness and to have the elk relocated to areas where hunting was permitted. He guaranteed that if a hunter employed his service and paid his fee, he would get the big game animal desired or Knievel would refund his fee. Using the hunting and fishing skills taught to him by his grandfather, Knievel started the Sur-Kill Guide Service. Īfter the birth of his first son, Kelly, Knievel realized that he needed to come up with a new way to support his family financially. : 21–22 Knievel tried out with the Charlotte Clippers of the Eastern Hockey League in 1959, but decided that a traveling team was not for him. The United States Olympic Committee ended up paying the Czechoslovakian team's expenses to avoid an international incident. When the Czechoslovakian officials went to the box office to collect the expense money that the team was promised, workers discovered the game receipts had been stolen. Knievel was ejected from the game minutes into the third period and left the stadium. To help promote his team and earn some money, he convinced the Czechoslovakian Olympic ice hockey team to play the Butte Bombers in a warm-up game to the 1960 Winter Olympics (to be held in California). Shortly after getting married, Knievel started the Butte Bombers, a semi-pro hockey team. After his army stint, Knievel returned to Butte, where he met and married his first wife, Linda Joan Bork. His athletic ability allowed him to join the track team, where he was a pole vaulter. During the late 1950s, Knievel joined the United States Army. Seeking new thrills and challenges, Knievel participated in local professional rodeos and ski jumping events, including winning the Northern Rocky Mountain Ski Association Class A Men's ski jumping championship in 1959. In the same jail that night was a man named William Knofel, who had the nickname “Awful Knofel” this led to Knievel being referred to as “Evel Knievel”. Knievel's website said that he chose his nickname after spending a night in jail in 1956 after being arrested for reckless driving. Knievel was fired when he made the earth mover do a motorcycle-type wheelie and drove it into Butte's main power line, leaving the city without electricity for several hours. He was promoted to surface duty, where he drove a large earth mover. Knievel left Butte High School after his sophomore year and got a job in the copper mines as a diamond drill operator with the Anaconda Mining Company, but he preferred motorbiking to what he called "unimportant stuff". ![]() Representative from Montana, Pat Williams (b. Knievel was a cousin of the former Democratic U.S. At the age of eight, Knievel attended a Joie Chitwood auto daredevil show, to which he gave credit for his later career choice as a motorcycle daredevil. Knievel and his brother were raised in Butte by their paternal grandparents, Ignatius and Emma Knievel. Robert and Ann divorced in 1940, after the 1939 birth of their second child, Nicolas, known as Nic. His surname is of German origin his paternal great-great-grandparents emigrated to the United States from Germany. Knievel was born on October 17, 1938, in Butte, Montana, the first of two children of Robert E. 2.8.2 Six Flags Evel Knievel roller coaster.
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