Heres a video I pulled together:

As I moved through the crowd, I saw some familiar faces and a whole bunch of new ones. I don't get out to too many events in this particular area so it was a great opportunity to meet some new folks.

A Chaplin for the Massachusetts State Police was on hand to offer a blessing of the bikes. He offered up a prayer and moved around the crowd sprinkling holy water as he went.

Soon after, the rider lined up and hit the road. The starting of the engines quickly resulted in a deafening roar and filled the air with that ever so familiar smell of exhaust. I moved into position to film the riders heading out on the road. It took more than three minutes to get everyone out!

I didn't have the opportunity to ride on this one as I had to head over to the

This was truly a family event. There were men, women, and plenty of children. More importantly, there were moms and dads, grandmothers and grandfathers. Nothing demonstrates this more than the video above. If you've already watched this, and didn't see it, I want you to watch closely when the ride takes off. Kevin King is riding one of the lead bikes and appears on the left of the screen. His grandson is the little guy to the far left waving to all of the bikes as they pull out. Listen and watch closely as you'll see Kevin call his grandson over to give him a kiss before they take off. I was really touched by this when I was reviewing the video later.

On to the men and women of the hour. As I previously mentioned, This was a ride to raise money for the 747th's Family Support Group. That said, some of the members of the 747th were present for the ride and also helped organize and manage it. These are a group of brave men and women who are selflessly placing themselves in harms way in an effort to keep us safe here at home.

This ride was truly a success. Colleen King tells me they had 185 bikes and 257 people, not including the folks who just came for the party afterwards. They raised roughly $6,000.00 which should go a long way to helping the family support group out while the group is overseas.

Congratulations to Colleen and Kevin King, Captain Jones, Stephanie Winslow and all of the other volunteers who made this a fantastic event. Our thoughts and prayers will be with these folks while they're gone!

- Ian B. Creswell