Aired: 21:30 Thursday 26 February 1987 on BBC Two
From the BBC 40 Minutes series. Episode title: Bad Blood
Episode description: Riding the Iron Horse - a roaring, full-throated Harley Davidson - across the open prairie is an American dream. Fifty thousand leather-clad bikers make romance come true as they converge, from all over the States and beyond, on Sturgis, a sleepy farming town in South Dakota.

The 48th annual Black Hills Motorcycle Rally brings together weekenders on little Japanese bikes and hard-core, all-American Wild Ones. It's a raucous summer week of racing, drinking, partying and generally raising hell.

'The Sons of Silence' is one of the many bikers' chapters here. The Sons believe in America, freedom, white power, and loyalty to each other. They've got their own chaplain; women are not members, but 'property'. Rebels against convention, they live by their own strict code - 'We are the Sons of Silence until death'.

Music BRENDAN CROKER
Photography KEVIN ROWLEY
Film editor RAY FRAWLEY
Director TED CUSBY
Editor EDWARD MIRZOEFF