ESSEX — Area motorcycle riders will converge in Essex this Sunday for Nelson’s 25th Ride.
The riders will leave from the commercial parking lot at 239 Western Ave. for a 25-mile “slow ride” past Nelson Selig’s memorial roadside marker on Route 133 near Bruni’s Marketplace in Ipswich, through Hamilton, Wenham, Beverly, Manchester-by-the-Sea, and back.
Selig, of Essex, was killed May 2, 2000, while riding his motorcycle on Route 133 in Ipswich. A 19-year old driver crossed the center line, colliding into his oncoming motorcycle .His death is a mantra for motorcycle safety and awareness and “Bikers Helping Bikers” here and throughout the state’s motorcycle community.
Nelson’s Ride this year also remembers Selig’s friend, Jason Hallock, formerly of Gloucester and Manchester. Hallock was co-founder of the first Nelson’s Memorial Ride in 2000 and continuous co-chair and vice president of the ride’s survivors fund until his cancer-related death in March 2023.
“Jason was our ‘soul connection’ with Nelson and his family,” fellow co-founder Paul Cote of Amesbury said.
“Many of us did not know Nelson. Jason did. When we had to make tough or conflicting decisions, Jason was the go-to guy, saying, ‘Nelson would agree with this way,” Cote said. “We miss Jason but have some comfort knowing he is reunited with his criend Nelson.”
“Twenty-five years have passed. Nelson’s kids, who our community rallied to help back then, are adults and Nelson’s grandchildren now will see the legacy left due to the grandfather they never met,” Cote said.
Selig’s death spurred volunteer “citizen biker” activism and advocacy locally and throughout the state, according to Cote, and with the National American Motorcyclists Association, sharing information and programs instituted here spurred others.
The Commonwealth’s Motorcycle Safety Awareness Proclamation has helped reduce accidents, claims Cote, who remains actively involved. The proclamation marks the last week of March through the end of April, when over 17,000 Essex County motorcycles are coming out of winter’s hibernation, as “Motorcycle Safety Awareness Period” since then-acting Gov. Jane Swift signed bill cosponsored by state Senate Minority Leader Bruce Tarr of Gloucester and then Rep. Brad Hill, R-Ipswich, in June 2002,
“Nelly’s Law,” a bill also co-sponsored by Tarr and Hill, and signed into law June 10, 2004, by then Gov. Mitt Romney, put a motorcycle safety awareness module into auto driving training programs’ course curriculum.
“Some of us still involved wanted to recognize how still important he and his family have been to our community,” Cote said of Selig. “They don’t forget and we won’t either,” Cote said.
Minimal traffic delays may expected along the ride route between noon and 1 p.m. The ride starts out of Route 22 in Essex, moves on to Route 133 in Ipswich, to Route 1A in Hamilton and Wenham, takes back roads into Beverly and Manchester-by-the-Sea, then returns to Routes 133 and 22 back to 239 Western Ave., Essex.