by Claire Martin, Denver Post
April 17, 2005
Danny "Bummer" Faulkner, a devoted Harley-Davidson rider, was 52 when he was fatally struck April 8 in a predawn hit-and-run accident as he packed up after finishing a shift in a street construction zone.
The oldest of five children, he was raised as a Mormon. His mother, Laura Fiscus, viewed her son's natural independence as a mixed blessing.
When Danny Faulkner was 11, Fiscus divorced his father and moved her children from California to Colorado. Danny Faulkner became a de facto parent, taking charge of his brothers and sister during the hours between the end of their school day and the end of their mother's workday.
"He watched out for me and the younger ones," Fiscus said. "He was the leader of the pack. He was my protector."
At her insistence, he put on a suit to attend Sunday church services. Both the suit and the services chafed as he grew older, taller, bigger and increasingly alienated from conventional society. With his mother newly remarried, Faulkner relaxed fully into adolescence.
A few months short of his 18th birthday, Faulkner moved out of the house, taking only a few things. His Sunday suit was not among them.
Faulkner bought a Harley motorcycle and happily embraced the hard-core hog-lover's lifestyle. He wore leathers. He joined an outlaw motorcycle gang.
His size and bulk -- Faulkner was nearly 6 feet tall and weighed more than 200 pounds at his heaviest -- earned him the job and reputation as the gang's enforcer. He boasted that his new nickname, "Bummer," was what people said when Faulkner appeared to show targets their subordinate role in his universe.
"Whenever someone on the gang was crossed, they'd send my dad to take care of it," said his daughter, Christina Fox. "When he came into the room, people went, 'Bummer."'
Faulkner fathered two children with a girlfriend. When Christina was 4, her mother took her and son Mykal and moved away. Christina did not see her father again until she was 19.
Faulkner's life cycled through phases. He was a licensed electrician and occasionally worked as a subcontractor.
He was among the electricians who helped convert the former downtown Denver department stores into high-end condominiums in the 1980s and 1990s.
He lived modestly. He spent little on clothing, favoring a standard uniform of jeans and a T-shirt -- "a T-shirt with a derogatory saying on it," Christina Fox observed -- when he wasn't in his leathers. He saw no reason to invest in music that postdated his favorite band, ZZ Top. He kept his shoulder-length hair in a ponytail and rarely trimmed the beard that fell to his chest.
Apart from rent and utility expenses, his paycheck went into his Harley, trips to biker conventions in South Dakota and weekends in the Black Hawk casinos.
His luck at the casinos became a minor legend, especially after he won $80,000. He spent the winnings on two new Harleys -- one for himself, the other for his girlfriend. He bought tiny Harley jackets for his two young grandsons.
Periodically, Faulkner relied on income through even riskier channels.
At least eight times during his adult life, Faulkner was arrested on suspicion of possessing or distributing marijuana and dangerous drugs, and he served a three-year term in 1993 after being found guilty of a drug-related felony.
His checkered criminal history sat uneasily on his relatives' shoulders.
His mother prefers to remember her son's tender side. Four years ago, she had to put down her longtime pet dog. When Faulkner found out, he promptly rode his motorcycle over to the Fiscuses' trailer home. When he saw his mother, he undid his leather jacket and tenderly brought out a little Boston terrier puppy.
"Mom, you have to have a dog," he told her. "You've always had a dog."
At her suggestion, the maternal lament "Danny Boy" played at his funeral, which marked Faulkner's first church appearance in decades. Against his daughter's wishes, he was buried in a suit, along with underwear specially purchased for the occasion.
"I wanted him to be buried in his leathers and his biker boots," Christine Fox said. "A suit and tie? My dad would never wear a suit, ever. It wouldn't happen. When they asked me about underwear, I said that I thought Dad never owned a pair. He's probably feeling very constricted."
The family suggests donations to Dan the Flagman Memorial Fund, in care of any local US Bank.
Besides his daughter and mother, survivors include son Mykal Faulkner of Dacono; stepfather Keith Fiscus of Thornton; brothers Lawrence Faulkner of Denver, Jimmy Faulkner of Scottsdale, Ariz., Kenneth Faulkner of Thornton and Robert Faulkner of Strasburg; sister Kerrie Ramirez of Littleton; and two grandsons.
As originally published
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"A suit and tie? My dad would never wear a suit, ever. It wouldn't happen. When they asked me about underwear, I said that I thought Dad never owned a pair. He's probably feeling very constricted."
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