Sturgis Motorcycle Rally

Sturgis, a prairie town on the westernmost edge of South Dakota, claims only 6,000 permanent residents. But the town swells to nearly a half million for the first week of August every summer during the famous motorcycle rally.
Most of the people who come work hard the rest of the year just to be able to afford the trip. The men wear wife beaters, black vests, biker boots and jeans that seem to be at least 30 years old. Bikini-clad women don leather chaps. There are probably more tattoos per square mile here than anywhere on the face of the planet. People camp out and mill around open fields littered with empty beer cans. There are sunburns that hurt to look at. And as nighttime falls, you can see the lights of cigarettes for miles.
Then imagine the sounds. Music either blasting or serving as quiet white noise as strangers and friends gather to compare their stories and bikes. And drivers revving up their engines to suggest approval when they see something they liked. Beer bottles breaking one after another.
At the end of 2008 rally, 66 marriage licenses had been issued, three rally-related deaths occurred, millions of t-shirts had been sold, the South Dakota economy claimed $10.5 million in taxable sales from the rally, and 543 tons of garbage hauled away. These are just some of the faces and stories from another ordinary Sturgis Motorcycle Rally in America’s heartland.