Dorothy Dot Robinson - Motorcycling's First Lady and Legend
Radio - Nov 3, 2009

Born on April 22, 1912, in Melbourne, Australia, Dot Robinson was a motorcyclist before she was even born. When her mother went into labor with Dot, her father, James Goulding, loaded Dot's mother into a sidecar rig and dashed off to the hospital.

Goulding was a sidecar designer and amateur racer and his designs were renowned for their reliability. In 1918, Goulding moved to the United States to expand his sidecar business and eventually settled in Saginaw, Mich., where the family purchased a motorcycle dealership. Dot grew up around motorcycles and started riding at a young age. She met her future husband, Earl, while working at the dealership when she was in high school.

Dot set a standard for women motorcyclists. She proved that you can be a lady and still ride a motorcycle. She paved the way for women to ride motorcycles. The women of the nineties can still be professional women: e,g,, doctors, lawyers, teachers, engineers, accountants, clerks, cashiers, home-makers, mothers, grandmothers, and they can still step outside, throw a leg over a bike and take off cross country. She proved that you can be a lady, still compete with the men and not be a man-hater.

Her mission: Ride, race, unite female riders, support the industry, and look damn good doing it!

Born April 22, 1912 in Australia

• Daughter of renowned sidecar manufacturer James Goulding
• James Goulding drove wife, Mary, to the hospital on a Harley with a sidecar and they brought Dot home the same way.
• James Goulding moved sidecar business to America in 1918
• Dot’s parents rode 4,200 miles in 18 days
• Goulding opened a Harley-Davidson dealership in Michigan
• Dot met future husband, Earl Robinson, at the dealership

Earl teaches Dot how to ride on his 1925 Harley-Davidson JD.

• 1931 – Dot and Earl marry.
• 1933 – Arthur Davidson (yes, that Davidson) learns of the young couple, encourages them to buy her father’s dealership and gives them the $3,000 they needed to get started during the Great Depression.
  
                                      
  

• 1935 – Dot and Earl set the transcontinental sidecar record from Los Angeles to New York in 89 hours and 58 minutes (before the US highways were completely paved in the western US).
• Moved the dealership to Detroit – would become one of the top-grossing dealerships in the nation
• Dot was business manager/bookkeeper
• Dealership in operation through the 1970’s

Dot spent much of the 1930’s competing in weekend endurance runs. Note: she was 5’2” tall and 115 pounds. There was no woman’s class and she participated in more than 50 runs.

• 1930 – First victory in the Flint 100 mile Enduro – perfect score.
• 1930’s Dot and her dad, James, compete in the Thanksgiving Day Enduro. They were teased as the “woman and the old man.” They won first place.
• 1937 – Second place in the grueling 2-day Jack Pine Run. Less than half of the competitors even finished the race. Two days, 500 mile off-road event forcing competitors to average 24 miles per hour, checking in at check points, fording rivers, going through sand and very rough terrain.
• 1940 – Dot won the Jack Pine run in the sidecar class. She was the driver and the only one to complete the 500 mile.
• 1940 – First woman to win an AMA national competition. Only 7 of 51 riders finished. She won again in 1946.

After Dot won the Michigan State Championship and the Ohio State Championship, she was going to compete in the National Endurance Run, but the AMA director tried to keep Dot from racing, saying it was women in general, but Dot was the only woman trying to race. She fought by gathering thousands of signatures on a petition, and still he wouldn’t budge.

Dot said, “So I loaded up that great big carton of petitions and went into his office one day when he was sitting at his desk, turned them upside down on his desk and snowed him under. Later, he became a friend, and he told me that nobody ever raised that much hell all over the country. I turned motorcycling upside down, and I intended to!”

• Dot supported the AMA’s legislative efforts throughout her life, as well as supporting the creation of the museum/hall of fame.
• 1998 - One of only two women in the AMA Hall of Fame. Both she and her husband, Earl were inducted.

Dot and Earl competed in many 24-hour marathons from 1955-1962, to see who could log the most miles around an oval track. Once begun, participants could not stop for mechanical problems; only for fuel and bathroom breaks. Dot’s strategy was to sleep the first eight hours and let everyone get tired. Then she would jump in for the last 16 hours and win.

• Dot worked as a motorcycle courier for a defense contractor during WWII.
• Teamed with Linda Allen Dugeau to found Motor Maids; the oldest female rider organization in the country, and it is still going strong.
• President of Motor Maids for 25 years where she logged many of her miles recruiting members to join women with a passion for riding safely and with a positive image.

Dot maintained her personal appearance with great attention to detail. Everyone who speaks of her recalls her perfectly applied makeup and fashionable attire. The same was said about her personal conduct; always a lady and always ready for the camera. 

“Hap,” a Honda dealer recalls, “chased that woman for two days through mud and trees,” and never caught her. At the end of the race, all the guys tramped into the local bar, but not Dot. She went to her room and, “I’ll never forget that picture: Dot walking into the bar in a black sheath dress and a pill box hat.” She was always ready for the camera.

In all her efforts to promote females, Dot respected men and didn’t hold any animosity toward them. She said she didn’t think in terms of men and women. She was always determined to finish the events an always wanted to win first place.

Old enough to be on social security and a grandmother three times, Dot still rode a pink Harley-Davidson with a built-in lipstick holder through 1998. She was in her eighty’s when she had to give it up because of knee problems, but not before she spent several years with Earl (who had to quit riding sooner than Dot) in the sidecar next to her. She said, “I made the fatal mistake along the way. I got old!”

Dot rode an estimated 1.5 million miles in her lifetime on 35 motorcycles. She died in 1999, a rider, racer, champion, wife, mother, grandmother, business woman, organizer, supporter, fashion plate, lady and legend – beat that!