Advance copy from the Tri-Town Transcript Community Newspapers story on "Friends of Marty" Ride, this Sunday, August 3rd, from the Gateway Pub, Lawrence.
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A memorial ride and fundraiser will be held for Marty Johnson on Aug. 3 at the Gateway pub in Lawrence. The Middleton man
A ride for Marty
By Brendan Lewis/blewis@cnc.com
Wed Jul 30, 2008, 12:07 PM EDT
Middleton -
Middleton’s Marty Johnson wasn’t someone you could ignore. Whether he was making a room erupt with laughter or offering up help, friends and family say the kind and generous 21-year-old brought life into every situation.
“You can’t sum him up in a paragraph,” longtime friend Loretta Swift said. “He was always larger than life.”
Tragically, Johnson’s life was taken in an instant, the result of a motorcycle accident in June. Johnson had collided with a tree on Washington Street in Topsfield in the early morning on June 19. Since then, crosses and flowers have been placed around the area near the crash site as a memorial for the Middleton man. He is survived by his girlfriend, Melissa, and their unborn child.
To honor him, friends and family are gathering this Sunday in Lawrence for a ceremony and motorcycle ride. The ride will also serve as a fundraiser with proceeds going to his girlfriend to help support their child.
“I think its wonderful to keep his memory alive,” Johnson’s mother, Donna, said about the ride. “He loved motorcycles…so he died doing something that he really loved.”
The ride will leave the Gateway Pub on Merrimac Street in Lawrence around noon on Sunday, Aug. 3. Riders, who donate $15, will go through Old Andover Center, then down Route 114 into Middleton, past the Johnson family house.
Swift, who is engaged to Johnson’s older brother Philip, said she had known Johnson since he was little kid.
“He had these huge broad shoulders. I always called him my big little brother,” Swift said.
Although sometimes stubborn, Swift said Johnson would always be the person in the room that would make you laugh.
“He was hilarious,” Swift said. “He is all around a great kid, he would do anything for anyone.”
Both Swift and Johnson’s girlfriend, Melissa, will be speaking at the ceremony before the ride. While the Gateway Pub was scheduling a ride for August, they decided to change their plans and use the ride to honor Johnson’s life.
Paul Cote, president of the Massachusetts Motorcycle Survivors Fund, helped set up the ride in short notice so the Gateway Pub could host the fundraiser.
“The survivors fund is to help families of riders killed in accidents,” Cote said about the organization. As done in other survivor fund events, Cote said the pub will also host a raffle at the memorial where free rider training courses will be offered as prizes. IronStone Ventures, in North Andover, donated the training course vouchers for lessons.
“They’ve gone out of their way to make this a very special memorial…a ride that people will remember,” Donna said.
