Evel Knievel’s Caesars Palace Jump: A Daredevil’s Legacy

[00:00:00] On New Year's Eve, December 31, 1967, the air in Las Vegas was abuzz anticipation when they were attempting to see something that had never been seen before.

[00:00:12] Where Evel Knievel, a daredevil growing in popularity, was prepared to launch himself over the iconic Caesar Palace fountain on a motorcycle, a 140-foot leap that could make or break him literally.

[00:00:28] What followed was a moment of gravity that pushed the limits of human endurance and cemented Knievel's name in the history books, in sports history forever, but it came at a price.

[00:00:41] Today we dive into Evel Knievels Caesar Palace Jump and what made it so iconic and cemented him as one of the greatest daredevils of all time on Daily Sports History.

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[00:01:59] Welcome to Daily Sports History.

[00:02:01] I'm Ethan Rees, your guide as you daily learn more about sports history, increasing your sports knowledge.

[00:02:10] And today's trivia question to listen out for is,

[00:02:13] what was the record for Evel Knievel's longest jump?

[00:02:17] Listen throughout the episode to find out the answer.

[00:02:19] And if you miss it, I will give it to you at the very end.

[00:02:24] Now, Evel Knievel was not his real name.

[00:02:27] His real name was Robert Craig Knievel.

[00:02:29] And he was born in Montana and was the first of two children.

[00:02:32] And by the age of eight, his parents decided to leave him and his brother to be raised by their grandparents.

[00:02:40] And while growing up there, Knievel took in a show done by Joey Clintwood, who was an auto daredevil.

[00:02:47] And this really festered the dream of him becoming a daredevil himself.

[00:02:51] And he actually dropped out of high school his sophomore year to get a job in the Comper Mines as a diamond driller.

[00:02:57] And he was later fired from this job when he drove a large earth mover and made it do a motorcycle wheelie and drove it into a main power line.

[00:03:07] And leaving the city without electricity for several hours.

[00:03:14] And he was later fired from when he got arrested for reckless driving.

[00:03:21] And he got put in a jail cell next to a guy named William Naufil, who said his nickname was Awful Naufil.

[00:03:26] And so he said, well, I'm Evel Knievel.

[00:03:29] Because he liked the way it rhymed.

[00:03:31] And after getting fired from his mining job, he really took to participating in local rodeo shows and ski jumps.

[00:03:37] And even won the North Rocky Mountain Ski Association Class A Ski Jumping Championship, showing he had the thrill for jumping things early.

[00:03:46] But before the 50s was over, he joined the U.S. Army.

[00:03:50] And after his army deployment, he came back to home to Butte, where he joined a semi-pro hockey team.

[00:03:56] And he even tried out for the Charlotte Clippers, who were part of the Eastern Hockey League at the time.

[00:04:02] Which was a minor professional league.

[00:04:04] But he did not end up making the team.

[00:04:06] But decided he didn't want to travel for hockey.

[00:04:09] As his first son, Kelly, was being born from him and his wife, Linda.

[00:04:13] So he wanted something maybe a little more stable.

[00:04:16] And in the early 1960s, he discovered the motocross circuit.

[00:04:20] Which is where dirt bikes race and go over jumps and mounds.

[00:04:24] And he actually had a lot of success.

[00:04:25] But in 1962, he broke his collarbone and shoulder in a motocross accident.

[00:04:30] And the doctor said he shouldn't race for at least six months.

[00:04:33] But still needing help and support from his family, he switched his career to being an insurance salesman.

[00:04:40] Now, Knievel actually had a lot of success selling insurance.

[00:04:43] And it was a steady job for him and his family.

[00:04:45] But he didn't get that thrill that he got from hockey or motocross.

[00:04:51] He wanted that thrill.

[00:04:52] And so when the company refused to promote him to vice president, he decided to quit his job.

[00:04:57] And moved to the state of Washington where he opened up a motorcycle dealership and promoted motocross racing.

[00:05:04] Him and the other dealers at the time had trouble selling these Japanese imports because of this deep competition in the auto industry.

[00:05:10] And because of this, he had to eventually close.

[00:05:13] And he went to go work at a motorcycle shop.

[00:05:16] And he still wanted that thrill.

[00:05:18] And remembering when he saw Joey Chitwood's stunt driving, he thought he could do similar things.

[00:05:23] So he started to promote himself and rent out venues and write press releases, setting up shows and selling tickets to watch him do amazing stunts.

[00:05:32] He would entice crowds with wheelies.

[00:05:35] And then he would jump long distances.

[00:05:37] Like he would jump 20 feet of rattlesnakes and two mountain lions.

[00:05:41] After this, he realized how much money he could make at this.

[00:05:44] And he would just need to hire more and more people to make it even more of a spectacle to get more people to show up.

[00:05:50] And so he started hiring other daredevils to work with him.

[00:05:54] And he officially appeared.

[00:05:55] Him and his daredevils officially debuted on January 3rd, 1966 at the National Date Festival in Indio, California.

[00:06:03] And this was the Evel Knievel and his motorcycle daredevils.

[00:06:08] And it wasn't long.

[00:06:09] And in only their second appearance in February that year, Evel Knievel would do a stunt where he would jump spread eagle over a speeding motorcycle.

[00:06:18] But Evel jumped too late and was hit by the motorcycle, hit him in the groin, tossing him 15 feet.

[00:06:25] So it wasn't long before he got his first daredevil injury that would follow him throughout his career.

[00:06:31] He would have to be hospitalized for his injuries, but would be released and return that very day to finish out his performance.

[00:06:38] And he would return a month later to finish out his performance.

[00:06:42] But the problem was he lost his daredevils as well.

[00:06:46] So it was all back on him.

[00:06:48] So he started traveling to small towns doing a solo act.

[00:06:50] And at the time, it was common for stunt motorcycle stunt drivers to jump animals and pools.

[00:06:55] So he changed it up by jumping over cars and add more and more cars.

[00:07:00] And he would continue to get larger and larger.

[00:07:02] With each successful jump, the public wanted more cars and wanted bigger jumps.

[00:07:08] By March 1967, he was jumping over 15 cars.

[00:07:11] In July that same year, he was attempting to do it in Graham, Washington.

[00:07:15] But he didn't have enough speed and hit the last vehicle and was thrown from the bike and suffered a serious concussion.

[00:07:22] But true to form, he would come back months later to finish out that show and jump the 15 cars for Graham, Washington again.

[00:07:30] But again, he fell short.

[00:07:33] He crashed, breaking his left wrist, right knee, and two ribs.

[00:07:36] But what was impressive was him missing the jump wasn't necessarily a bad thing.

[00:07:42] Because we all know this, we like to see injuries when they're not to us.

[00:07:46] It's something that happens a lot.

[00:07:47] You watch America's Home Video.

[00:07:49] When you see someone fall, when you see someone get hit by a baseball or get hit by a bat on accident, it's something we enjoy watching as people.

[00:07:57] It's just you feel the pain and you laugh and it's just like an emotion that comes over you.

[00:08:03] And he was giving you that emotion with these jumps.

[00:08:05] You thought it was so amazing to watch him fly through the air, but also you kind of wanted to see him crash.

[00:08:12] And that's actually what increased his popularity is that even though he crashed, he would come back to that same place.

[00:08:18] And people would come back to watch him even though he failed before because they wanted to see, is this going to happen again?

[00:08:24] It was something you wouldn't expect that failure could help you succeed.

[00:08:28] And that's exactly what happened with Evel Knievel.

[00:08:30] So by the end of 1967, Evel could see that he had something that people wanted to watch.

[00:08:37] And he thought, I need to do something that will catch the nation's attention.

[00:08:41] So he connected with the Caesar's Palace who had the famous fountains that you've seen on countless movies.

[00:08:47] Or if you've ever gone to Vegas, you've seen these fountains.

[00:08:50] They put on a great show and they're iconic.

[00:08:52] And he wanted to jump over them.

[00:08:54] And the jump would be about 140 feet, which at the time would be a record for the longest jump on a motorcycle.

[00:09:01] And he was able to talk the Caesar's Palace into it as he knew he would garner attention,

[00:09:05] not only from local media, but from national media doing something like this.

[00:09:10] And the more people you get to watch, the more people that will come visit your casino and make you money.

[00:09:16] So Vegas agreed.

[00:09:17] And to set up for it, Knievel got a Triumph Bonneville T120, which was a 600cc motorcycle that he had modified to increase the power.

[00:09:27] But in doing so, he actually made it heavier as well and more difficult to control.

[00:09:31] Because at this time, something that's very different than what we do now is Evel didn't use a lot of mathematics or physics to figure out how fast he needed to go and the angle he needed to take.

[00:09:43] He really just went as fast as he could, hoping the jump would make it to the other side.

[00:09:49] Something that now we use a lot of physics and numbers to measure how fast we need to go to make it.

[00:09:55] And it's different.

[00:09:57] It's safer.

[00:09:57] But at the time, it just wasn't really thought of.

[00:10:00] So December 31st, 1967 comes.

[00:10:03] And crowds and thousands are finding anywhere to stand to watch this epic moment.

[00:10:09] And Knievel comes out in his iconic white jumpsuit with stars on it, similar to what Elvis wore at the time.

[00:10:16] And he takes off and he hits the ramp about 90 miles an hour, launching him into the air, leaving everyone silent as they watched him fly over the fountain.

[00:10:26] And then just towards the end, it looks like he may not be able to make it.

[00:10:30] And that front wheel just clips the edge of the landing ramp just a little bit, tossing him over the bicycle as he bounces on the ground multiple times, flipping onto his head and over like a rag doll.

[00:10:44] Medics quickly rush to the scene to check on him and take him to the hospital.

[00:10:48] At the time, he is unconscious and they rush him to the local hospital where he stays in a coma for 29 days due to the result of a severe concussion.

[00:10:59] He also suffered a broken pelvis, a fractured femur, a broken hip.

[00:11:04] Both wrists were broken and multiple ribs were fractured.

[00:11:08] Now, like we said before, just because he wrecks doesn't mean it wasn't a success.

[00:11:12] This garnered so much attention and the aftermath actually garnered attention where everyone wanted to know, was he going to live?

[00:11:19] Was he going to survive?

[00:11:20] Did they just watch someone pass away?

[00:11:23] And footage of the jump was actually sold to ABC who broadcasted it widely and it made Evel Knievel a household name.

[00:11:31] With many speculating whether he would live or die, Knievel would not die.

[00:11:35] He would come out of this and not only would he come out of this,

[00:11:38] Now, he had people that were his fans that wanted to see him and he would not disappoint.

[00:11:44] He would continue to push the limits even after this to see what successful things he could do in the future.

[00:11:52] It would take him months to recover from this, but he would do his next jump on May 25th, 1968,

[00:11:58] where he jumped 13 cars and again crashed on landing and broke his leg and foot.

[00:12:04] It wouldn't be until August of 1968 when he would have his next successful land and he could continue to grow.

[00:12:10] And this allowed him to do even more shows throughout the rest of the year.

[00:12:13] And by this time, he was a superstar.

[00:12:16] So everyone wanted to see him jump and he even had merchandise.

[00:12:20] There was a toy back in the day where the toy would jump over a ramp just like Evel.

[00:12:25] And lots of times crash just like Evel.

[00:12:27] But Evel did have a lot of successes.

[00:12:29] In October 25th, 1975, he actually jumped over 14 Greyhound buses at Kings Island in Cincinnati, Ohio,

[00:12:38] which was his longest jump of 133 feet.

[00:12:42] He had many more jumps in his life, more than we can go over, countless ones.

[00:12:47] But the last jump happened on January 31st, 1977, in Chicago, where he jumped 13 sharks, roughly 90 feet.

[00:12:55] And he crashed during a practice of his collarbone, his right arm, and it would be his final jump.

[00:13:01] He attempted to put jumps together in 1979 and 1980, but just couldn't make it happen.

[00:13:06] And he would officially retire.

[00:13:08] And in the 1990s, he required a life-saving liver transplant that resulted in him suffering from the effects of hepatitis C

[00:13:15] that he contracted from numerous blood transfusions that he received before 1992

[00:13:21] when they tested blood more rigorously than they did back in the day.

[00:13:25] And in 1999, he was only given a few days to live.

[00:13:28] When he got a call, he left the hospital and got a call saying that a young man had died in a motorcycle accident.

[00:13:35] It was a donor.

[00:13:35] He would be able to receive a transplant.

[00:13:38] He would go on to live until November 31st, 2007.

[00:13:41] Amazing for all that he had been through his life.

[00:13:44] He dealt with chronic pain after all his injuries and fell out of the limelight of the 1970s and 80s.

[00:13:51] But he's always remembered when we think of daredevils.

[00:13:54] But we still love to see these as we've seen Red Bull put on crazy jumps,

[00:13:58] including in December of 2024 when Robbie Madison jumped a distance of 346 feet in Melbourne, Australia.

[00:14:08] Thanks to the advances in technology, that stuff is possible and seems crazy amazing.

[00:14:13] But we still watch crazy stunts.

[00:14:15] If you watch Red Bull, Red Bull sponsors all these crazy jumps, like a guy jumping from space.

[00:14:20] And we just all love to see what will happen.

[00:14:23] And Evel Knievel really brought that out in everybody.

[00:14:28] I want to thank you for listening to today's episode.

[00:14:30] If you want to learn more about stunts, check out the Get Vertical Real Talk with Deidre Stunts,

[00:14:36] who's ready to dive into the nitty gritty world of Harley stunt writing

[00:14:39] with her background in professional stunt writing and deliver you the real deal of what all goes into the sport,

[00:14:46] behind the scenes, and in front of fans.

[00:14:49] We'll put a link in the description below for you to check her out.

[00:14:52] And if you enjoyed today's episode, please go wherever you're listening,

[00:14:55] leave us a rating or review, tell us who your favorite sports team is,

[00:14:59] and come back tomorrow for more daily sports history.

[00:15:04] And did you catch the answer to today's trivia question?

[00:15:06] What was the record for Evel's longest jump?

[00:15:10] And the record was 133 feet when he jumped over 14 Greyhound buses in 1975.