Unknown Bikers
| Also Known As | Unknown Bikers MC Unknown Bikers Motorcycle Club |
|---|---|
| Origins | |
| Founding Location | Williamsburg, Brooklyn, New York City |
| Territory | Union Avenue to Rodney Street and Metropolitan Avenue to South Fourth Street, Williamsburg |
| Lineage | |
| Successor(s) | Unknown Bikers MC (later motorcycle-club identity; exact continuity requires documentation) |
| Profile | |
| Structure | Neighborhood street gang later associated with a motorcycle club; complete membership and hierarchy uncertain |
| Activities | Street-club activity Inter-club conflict Biker and motorcycle-club activity |
| Politics | |
| Notable Members | Alicat (member from approximately 1976 to early 1980) Little Willie (identified in 1978 contemporary reporting) |
| Rivals | South 9 Bikers (territorially distinct but socially connected) Dukes Arabian Knights |
| Activity | |
| Status | Later motorcycle-club identity reported |
| Years Active | By 1970s–present claims (the later continuity claim is not fully independently documented) |
The Unknown Bikers were a Williamsburg, Brooklyn street gang and neighborhood club later associated with a motorcycle-club identity. A 1978 New York Times report described an Unknown Bikers group of approximately thirty youths in Williamsburg, wearing leather jackets and styling their bicycles after motorcycles.[1]
Later accounts describe the Unknown Bikers as a motorcycle club with a Williamsburg base, but their founding date, transition from youth gang to motorcycle club, and claimed long-term continuity should be kept separate from the contemporaneously documented 1970s street-gang phase.[2]
1970s Williamsburg club
The 1978 New York Times article placed the Unknown Bikers among the rival gangs of Williamsburg. It described the group as numbering about thirty, wearing waist-length leather jackets, and using remodeled Schwinn bicycles with elongated forks to resemble motorcycles.[1] The report also identified a territorial boundary between the Unknown Bikers and the Dirty Ones and described an abandoned building used by the Unknown Bikers as a makeshift church.
A later oral-history feature places the Unknown Bikers on a section of Southside Williamsburg extending from Union Avenue to Rodney Street and from Metropolitan Avenue toward South Fourth Street. It describes them as one of the major Williamsburg clubs of the period.[3] The boundaries are a participant's recollection rather than a complete contemporary survey.
Relationship with the South 9 Bikers
The oral history records that Alicat began hanging out with the Unknown Bikers around 1975 and became a member in 1976. It says that he moved over to the South 9 Bikers in early 1980, while the two groups were already socially connected.[3] This is evidence of movement and association between two clubs, not proof that they were one organization or that one commanded the other.
The same account describes the Unknown Bikers and South 9 Bikers as occupying different parts of Williamsburg and recalls conflict involving the Dukes and Arabian Knights. The incident includes contested personal identification and responsibility, so the article does not assign the conduct to every club member.[3]
Motorcycle-club continuity
Later motorcycle-club sources describe an Unknown Bikers MC based in Brooklyn and attribute an earlier founding date to the organization. One enthusiast account connects the club to Williamsburg and a later motorcycle-club presence, while noting a distinction between the Brooklyn club and an unrelated Italian group with a similar name.[2] These later claims are useful for tracing the club's self-described continuity, but they are not treated as independent proof of a 1970s founding date or an uninterrupted organization.
The Unknown Bikers should therefore be understood in two source-calibrated phases: a 1970s Williamsburg street club documented by contemporary reporting, and a later motorcycle-club identity described by later club-history sources. Whether those phases constitute one continuous institution remains unresolved in the reviewed record.
Organizational limits
This article covers the Williamsburg organization called the Unknown Bikers. It does not include every motorcycle club using the name, every person wearing biker-style clothing, or every participant in recalled inter-club conflicts. A complete roster, formal hierarchy, and uninterrupted institutional history have not been established.
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 “True Story of City Gang Life: No Glittery ‘West Side Story’”, The New York Times, March 6, 1978.
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 “Unknown Bikers MC”, One Percenter Bikers.
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 “Gangs of Old New York”, Vice, oral-history feature.