It’s amazing the guy lived to be 69 after all of his injuries or the lawsuits he’d be buried under from practically every other kid in the Seventies imitating him (I’m guilty of attempting a failed maneuver in Washington Park). I also remember so many of my peers having the Evel Knievel toys making jumps over stairs. My parents never thought he set a good example so my brother and I got big fat objections on receiving his Snake River rocket car playset.
Years later he was immortalized on The Simpsons as Captain Lance Murdock, Devlin from the Hanna Barbera cartoons and Harvey Birdman parodies, plus Brian Regan’s great routine ridiculing interviewers asking him about his disastrous jump at Caesar’s Palace. I’ll have to see if I have the clip, it’s pretty good if you’ve never heard it. Then I saw the actual footage one evening at Alamo Drafthouse which made it even funnier and more painful to watch.
Still, he’s not really to blame. Kids have been jumping off of ramps ever since the invention of the wheel.