I wish I had a snappy lead sentence for this article, but I don’t.
The story itself centers around Honda’s 1960s vintage Super 90, often referred to as the S90. And that begs the question: how much excitement can you generate from a bike powered by a single-cylinder OHC engine producing an advertised and undersized 8 horsepower?
There’s more. My first motorcycle was a brand new 1965 Honda S90, and apparently S90s were popular among many of my editorial colleagues, a fact I discovered while researching an S90 article penned by Ron Lawson for the April 1987 issue of Cycle World magazine. Turns out that Ron had learned, as he wrote, “the dark and mysterious ways of a manual clutch” from his S90. Sticking with CW’s staff, Western Advertising Manager Greg Blackwell (brother to AMA 500cc MX champ Mark Blackwell) owned an S90 during his youth, as did Associate Editor Cameron Bussard. Even Uber Columnist Peter Egan had owned one, although nobody can confirm if he ever tried to buy back his long-gone S90 from whoever ended up with it at whatever point in PE’s storied and adventurous life as a motojournalist. There are probably other “magazine guys” out there who previously owned S90s, and we all know who we are.
But I digress, and back to this article. In truth the story’s leadseed had been planted months before when I was photographing the red 1975 Honda CB400F featured in May/June 2022 . Joining me on that assignment was a former motorcycle industry insider, Jon Seidel, who, at 67 years young, currently lists his occupation on IRS tax forms as “Retired American Honda Employee.” His credentials are well deserved, too, and he continues seeking ways to promote the brand. He also keeps busy during his retirement cataloging relevant facts, data and related material about Honda
