Beyond Business

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Whether they are preserving the past or showcasing cultural possibilities, their complementary endeavors are extending their impact to much wider audiences while enhancing the capital city’s cultural opportunities.

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Historic Harley-Davidson of Topeka Already nationally renowned for its blend of new motorcycles and merchandise, a museum chronicling the iconic brand’s past, restoration capabilities and a barbecue restaurant open for lunch, Historic Harley-Davidson of Topeka’s transformation continues with the much-anticipated opening of an Evel Knievel museum.

The Evel Knievel Thrill Show and Museum will feature the world’s largest collection of his authentic performance leathers, jump bikes and memorabilia in a 16,000 square-foot expansion of the dealership. Experiential exhibits focused on the physics of Knievel’s triumphs and virtual reality simulations will give visitors an immersive view of Knievel’s 11-year motorcycle-jumping career in the 1960s and 1970s. Holding the Guinness World Record for surviving the most broken bones in a lifetime—433— Knievel attempted more than 75 jumps in his career.

The dealership’s reputation for risk and reinvention ultimately landed the lauded stuntman’s personal possessions in Topeka. Lathan McKay had purchased Knievel’s custom Mack Truck with a partner and needed to have it restored, which led him to Mike Patterson, the dealership’s owner, who had a national reputation for his restoration projects. Patterson and McKay, an avid Knievel collector, formed a bond and decided to open the museum.

Just as Knievel’s livelihood was tied to the extraordinary execution of a stunt, so too, is Mike Patterson’s.

GENERATIONS IN THE MAKING Patterson’s journey toward owning the Historic Harley-Davidson of Topeka dealership began with his paternal grandfather, Henry, winning a bicycling contest in Grand Junction, Colorado, in 1926. In front of 1,000 spectators, Henry rode his bike up and down a four-inch plank of wood in the street for two miles to set the world record. The 16-yearold received a ribbon, a gold watch, a write-up in the newspaper and a job offer to work at a bike shop that soon began selling Harley-Davidson motorcycles.

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Henry started his dealership in Topeka in 1949. He demonstrated that same single-minded focus he’d used to win the bike contest to persevere through an adjacent hotel fire that burned his building in 1950, damage inflicted by the 1951 flood at its new location at Sixth and MacVicar, and slow years when he was the sole employee.

Henry died in 1999, just two days after a barbecue bash celebrating his 50th year in business that was attended by friends, family, customers, community leaders and even the chief executive officer of Harley-Davidson at the Kansas Expocentre. Since Henry had grown up in the Depression, he tended to hang on to things—an old desk, parts drawers, oil and paint cans and other items collected throughout his career. Patterson and his family members realized they had the makings of a museum in the frugal patriarch’s honor.

Yesterday’s Motorcycle Museum features Harley-Davidson merchandise—beer cans, Barbie dolls, signs, helmets, goggles and Evel Knievel toys—as well as racing photographs and motorcycles ranging from 1928 to the 1980s. Five of the bikes on display were built with piles of parts Patterson and his crew refurbished. Some of the bikes never sold when Harley-Davidson’s popularity dipped.

“We just hung on to them so long they became relics,” Patterson says. “They became bikes we couldn’t sell and now wouldn’t sell.”

Yesterday’s opened in 2001, and Henry’s world-record achievement is prominently displayed.

RESTORING HISTORY Also in 2001, Patterson and his team started restoring bikes, a laborious process they became passionate about. They quickly cultivated an online following and clientele from coast to coast, including rock ‘n roll legend Jerry Lee Lewis. Lewis had received a 1959 H.D. Panhead model (Elvis received the second one) and wanted to restore it.

Patterson traveled to Lewis’ home in Mississippi to collect the bike in 2012.

“Someone had taken it apart five years earlier and all the parts were rusted and needed to be refurbished,” he says. “We brought it to Topeka in buckets, and when we took the bike back and placed it in his living room, he was overjoyed.”

Lewis ultimately sold the motorcycle for $385,000.

“It was a long, arduous job, but we were humbled and proud to do it,” Patterson says.

Patterson’s life’s work is intrinsically tied to motorcycles— riding them, buying them, selling them, fixing them and displaying them for new generations of fans to enjoy, yet he never tires of the continuing cycle.

“Really, the only reason I’m sitting here now is because my grandfather won that contest,” Patterson says. “It’s natural that we would enjoy vintage bikes and memorabilia because of our family’s history and the motorcycle company’s history.”

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Kansas Ballet Academy

Stephanie Heston and Alex Smirnov, owners of the Kansas Ballet Academy, are also using their business to fulfill a grander vision for the community.  They opened the dance academy in 2012 to instill a love for dance in children and audiences of all ages and dispel a misperception that ballet is an extracurricular activity only the rich can afford.

Alex and Stephanie, who performed in prestigious venues before settling in Topeka, wanted to bring renowned dancers to Topeka to dance in the “Nutcracker” and introduce new fans to the story’s splendor and Tchaikovsky score.

Since paying for professional performers and hand-painted backdrops from the Ukraine is costly, the couple created the nonprofit Kansas Ballet Foundation in 2013. Now the foundation also supports the couple’s efforts to bring dance to 30 State Street Elementary School students through an Access to the Arts pilot program, which is also supported through ARTSConnect and the Women’s Fund.

At 8 a.m. on Fridays, the students wear special “Dream Big” t-shirts and ballet flats and take their position at barres installed in the school’s black box performance area.

“Dance opens their horizons,” says Stephanie, who grew up in Topeka. “Keeping track of their t-shirts and their shoes each week teaches them responsibility.”

The students in grades two to four will perform with Kansas Ballet Academy students in a spring recital. Talented students will receive a full scholarship for classes at the academy.

Alex and Stephanie are frustrated that the aesthetics of ballet often eclipse the rigorous athleticism required.

“People think ballet is skipping around in a leotard, but it’s more like playing football while smiling and lifting girls overhead,” Stephanie says. “It takes your full body, and you have to be able to express emotion while executing the techniques.”

Both believed that Topeka would be the best place for establishing their dance academy in 2012.

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“We could have gone anywhere, and we chose Topeka,” says Alex, who first studied ballet at the age of 10 in a Russian boarding school. “We see the people who are behind the things that are happening downtown, and it’s personally gratifying for us to be a part of that by helping the next generation of artists through our academy and foundation.”

To that end, many of the Kansas Ballet Academy’s 200 students perform in more than 65 outreach events in malls, museums, performance venues, parks, retirement centers and schools, sharing their passion and joy with appreciative audiences who might not otherwise have an opportunity to experience ballet. Alex and Stephanie hope to eventually expand the pilot program at State Street to other schools.

“Our motto is ‘educate, inspire, uplift,’” Stephanie says. “We want students to know that dreams can be realized.”

EXPANDING THE DREAM While Alex and Stephanie are thrilled to see the progress Kansas Ballet has made over the past few years, they envision even more.  They want to build a dance academy that will be recognized as the premiere location to study ballet in the Midwest, to inspire a young generation of boys and girls to work hard and find joy in this art form of dance, and maybe someday discover that next ballet star like Misty Copeland that will put Topeka on the map.

"We know it is a big dream to have kids from all over the country come study with us here in Topeka," Alex says. "But this is our passion, and we have an obligation to the art form to pass our knowledge to the next generation of dancers. That is how it is been done for the past 200 years to make sure that ballet is still alive and relevant for generations to come."

The Kansas Ballet Foundation’s “Nutcracker” will be performed Dec. 16 and 17 at the Topeka Performing Arts Center with guests from the Boston Ballet and the Topeka Symphony Orchestra.

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