Larry Lawrence | March 19, 2019
Archives: Falling for Hollywood
In 1933, a motorcycle stunt showman named Skip Fordyce brought his barnstorming show to Hattiesburg, Mississippi. After Fordyce performed, one of the onlookers blurted out, “I can do anything you can do.” Fordyce looked over his shoulder and saw a long, lean, hungry looking boy who, at first glance, didn’t look like anything special. It was a teenaged kid named Carey Loftin.
Archives: Falling for Hollywood
Fordyce had traveled the country and along the way he’s heard many a young braggart in the crowds he performed for claiming the stunts he was doing were ‘no big deal.” Normally Fordyce would just ignore them, knowing from experience that calling their bluff would usually only result in a big-mouthed kid hurting himself. But Loftin didn’t come off like the typical young punk that Fordyce had to deal with, instead he appeared to just a clean-cut and confident-looking teenaged kid. Something told Fordyce to give the kid the chance.
“Show me,” Skip said. With that Loftin disappeared. Skip continued talking with the crowd of onlookers, thinking at first that maybe the kid was really just bluffing after all. Suddenly Loftin appeared, roaring back onto the field on his ancient cycle. Skip found himself watching a very solid performance as the kid reeled off a series of side stands and seat stands. Then the kid began bouncing on the seat, his feet landing in a different position with every jump. Then he bounced around and rode backwards. Then he turned the bike around and headed back toward the crowd. Skip could sense that this was to be the grand finale so he watched carefully. Suddenly the kid began jumping up and down on the seat and then unexpectedly he launched himself in the air, his body doing a complete flip and landing with his feet on the ground behind the speeding bike and holding on to the rear seat with his hands. He was steering the bike with his feet by digging in one shoe or the other. As the cycle neared Skip and the crowd, the kid snapped forward, popped up over the rear wheel and onto the seat before coming to a perfect stop.
Fordyce, like the rest of the crowd, was picking his jaw up off the ground. He hired Loftin on the spot.
Thus began the stunt-riding career of Carey Loftin, who would go on to be a motorcycle racer and eventually a renowned Hollywood stuntman.
Loftin was born on January 31, 1914 in Blountstown, Florida. The son of a preacher, Carey grew up Alabama and Mississippi. He went to high school in Hattiesburg, Mississippi. He began riding when he was 10 when he borrowed an old strap-drive Excelsior from a local blacksmith and proceeded to plow up a farm field, mostly with his face. In spite of such discouragement, the young Loftin continued to ride whenever he could get his hands on a machine.
The first motorcycle he owned was an antique 37-cubic-inch Indian single-cylinder that cost him the grand sum of $10.
“It was just about worth $10,” Loftin said in a 1953 interview with Cycle magazine. “There was a gutless wonder if you ever saw one. It was humiliating. Every cycle in town ran away from it, but it made a mechanic out of me.”
An athletic kid, Carey wasn’t content to merely ride his motorcycle. He learned to do acrobatic stunts while riding. He impressed his friends with his antics and continually pushed himself to do more difficult stunts. Loftin rode for various stunt shows in the 1930s, supporting himself during the Depression. During off times, he supplemented his income by working as a motorcycle mechanic.
After a stint in the Marine Corps, Loftin moved to Los Angeles in the late 1930s and took a job as a mechanic. He quickly broke into movie stunt work. Loftin’s expertise with motor vehicles, including cars, trucks and motorcycles, gave him the chance to contribute his skills to numerous films from the late 1930s until he retired in the early 1990s.
“The first stunt I did at Warner Bros. was a motorcycle wreck,” Loftin said. “The tires were supposed to shoot out from under me, so I jack-knifed it on this dusty road and took a big tumble. When they yelled “cut,” I got up, dusted myself off and started walking away. John Hudkins, nicknamed The Bear, took me by the arm, pulled me over, and said, ‘Son, you’re never going to make any money in this business. Limp till you make a deal.’ It was good advice and I took it.”
During the 1940s and ‘50s, Loftin raced in many Southern California events such as the Catalina Grand Prix, the Big Bear Run, the Greenhorn Enduro and others.
When race promoter J.C. Agajanian put on some thrill shows, Loftin came up with stunts that he claimed nearly turned “Aggie” grey. One example was a head-on collision between a car and a motorcycle. Everyone tried to talk Loftin out of it, but he insisted he could make it work. Finally, Carey convinced Agajanian to let him attempt the stunt. Everything went well during the stunt. Loftin hit the car head-on and sailed over the top of the roadster. As the spectators saw Loftin get up and dust himself off someone noticed the car was continuing on out of control. Loftin had kicked the driver in the head during the stunt, temporarily knocking him cold.
As a stunt driver and stunt coordinator, Loftin helped create some of the most exciting and famous chase sequences in movie history. His body of work spanned five decades and included classics such as “The French Connection,” “Bullitt,” “Vanishing Point,” and “Days of Thunder.” When Loftin worked on “Bullitt,” a fellow stuntman called Loftin “easily the best car man in the business,” and that praise was earned time and again throughout his lifetime.
Loftin avoided serious injury for much of his career. One of his worst injuries came in a big barroom brawl scene for the movie “Soldiers Three,” when a breakaway balcony collapsed before it was scheduled to fall. According to his son Doug, Loftin, who was well into his 70s, was hired by Clint Eastwood to work in the movie “The Rookie.” After five or six days of inactivity on the set, Loftin told Eastwood that he wasn’t getting his money’s worth out of him. Eastwood laughed and told Loftin they hired him to be on the set just so they could hear his stories.
Loftin died in 1997 at the age of 83. He was survived by his two sons, Doug and Jim. He was inducted into the AMA Motorcycle Hall of Fame in 2001.
